‘07. HENRY DARGER (we need a moment alone)

(You better give me the respect that I deserve
Or I'm a take it by force.)

Sucker, you better eye the
Pen(n) like Teller when I kick Gillette tricks:
Sharp tongue lever lifts close shave letters, licks
Ink-dipped feathertips wet with cuttlefish tint,
Then spits sepia print script.
This is the way I get prepped for the rhetoric:
Squids in a king-size ‘quarium (check),
Quills from the wings of a Peregrine (check),
Redwoods unwrapped and rapped up again.

Jet-setter Ledbetter bests aces to
Win, bends space in the end, straight tens,
Antenna transmitting amphetamine medicine
Sent between seams of skies and seaweeds with
Lines like tightrope designed to wind dope
Type taut in a fine tux and gussy up
Pressed Daedalus wax ebonous when I cut
Records like cross-cut shredders do evidence.

Finches flinch at the Doublemint writ:
Freshness quick to deliver true grit.
Hoss, I’m getting my kicks out of this, like
Docs on the patella to test reflexes.
Check the vestment, wrought in the details,
Running things straight through spiral seashells, with
Sentences like Stringer Bell hits, so you bet I’m
Better getting on with it.

(You better give me the respect that I deserve
Or I'm a take it by force.)

Now, you could bill it as a
Last-ditch effort while my throat sprays pepper, and
Temper’s on temperatures ne’er before measured, and
Pressure’s on critical levers. All you get is
Semper Fidelis: I never say never.
Stock up charts with auto parts like Checker, I’m a
Fend off fads and, when weary, take infinite
Offense to the bitter end, stewing even if I have to
Sit inside a room and spend a lifetime starving.

Pardon. You know a man's heart hardens. Who
Bent flesh to carbon pressed dark coal through a
Trial by fire into diamond. Tarnished
Metal needs a little bit of varnish. I could be the
Latter-day Darger: Sergeant-of-arms in an
Army of ardour, carving the carnage of
Carpenters' arbors, martyr alarming the
Ardent to arms in the palm. Sharpened

Pen-souls carve in and sten-soul parchment.
Stem-cells rehearse the fire like arson.
Men strike thin. I begin where the margins
Of book pages impart place, then I augment.
On to the end when the air of the art is
Absolved and prepared to depart from the carcass,
Marked for relieving the last breath breathed, which
Still won’t be the last from me.

(You better give me the respect that I deserve
Or I'm a take it by force.)