Six Poems by Randy Barnes

 

Opinions Consigned To Eruptive Causes

 

Stolen thoughts beyond the vistas

and one means damage with head-shots

the standard lines heat the stacks

street noise fattens the margins

adios amigos the not so secret code

murmurations at the borders with killer waves

so all bets are off in the Tombs of Abhorrence

game-changers anonymous blunt the stats

details suffered while sinking

grid block in the chill zone

this could take a stout lariat to anchor the shift

with contracts signed to pale applause

while harbours rise and conquer our bricks.

Blind Honey Bends The Wires

 

Tone knockers and peach suckers

natural bop in polyester

when the crash came bottles arose

dumb waiters cowered in shadows

all sway and slag

branch bob and trance glance

shudder to think a general malaise

time the bills got wasted pending peaks

fortune mongrels’ chart toppers

bush hunting for plotlines

the mirrors open for business

online stars poised for flash

knee-jerk night gig

old loner’s sentimental croon

another rye cracks the boredom

further reruns in the Horror Factory

you can catch it on the wind

no need to understand.

A Pill For Your Troubles

 

Hotrod Red in fascist garb

line’em up for the shake down

sails set for the quake and roll

rubber-neck or bust has taken over

some holiday delirium to squeak your soles

sugar tremens sticky with smirks

find a place to be then leave

not much personality impervious to loss

these vascular codes ticking within

nothing a tit wouldn’t warm

or a cap of happy to storm the range.

Minute Correction

 

In the Luna Cave she met her match

snake charmer and all a front beyond the swill

where Big Mama Blues set the room aglow

a buck-a-pop turned eyes inwards

contractions in the after-flow louvered and lean

after miles of nothing a sudden arc

hide those visions when The Man comes lurking

there’s scanners encrypting the uptick

revelations in the lode code

slug pumpers on the merge

faith in ploys and penury mopery

excitement in the riot realm

worm holes sucking sockets

a gnarl of naughts and knots

alive on arrival if censored so.

Wandering Caseload

 

The world went blank

I mean the Machines of Attraction

voids must be of necessity

enough to screw the brain

collapse empires while sleep ordains

comatose resurrection

and nothing the same

until it is.

 

 

Take Two

 

A tangler of emotive esteem

duckin’ metal and buckin’ bodies

cold hearts in a disturbance of plasmic intent

heads like coins shoved in slots

missing in action with snapped triggers

can’t help but grovel in all this traffic

numbed vulgarity faltering at the seams

a world on notice to smooth these exits

we’ve come in furor to air our doubts

punch holes in the sky to hide our wounds.

 

 

Randy Barnes has published far and wide since the 1970’s.  He was awarded the Lifetime Historian Beat Poet Laureate, Washington State, in 2020.  He continues to roam the bush in search of anything symphonic.