The Regent

The king left on a grand crusade,
A campaign ‘gainst that dragon or this demon,
I’m his regent,
His steward,
I was to warm this volcanic throne,
Until his triumphant return,

Yet the kingdom rots without him,
As if its lifeblood has been drained,
The peasants grow skeletal and despondent,
The very earthen foundations of our nation crumble,
Our royal academia lectures only madness now,
Our lone remaining knight now rides a pale horse,

Look yonder to the fields under my reign,
And see that they are barren,
As if a royal magic is dispelled,
This charge seems a curse,
He bade me this unwanted duty,
The crown mocks me from its waiting pedestal.

Rotten Vulture

Atop a statue once depicting liberty,
Perches a foul creature,
An avian actor,
Decaying piece by ruinous piece,
A scavenger feigning regality,
A vulture wearing the feathers of an eagle,
Mould and droppings falling upon a flag,

Nonetheless this animal is loved and reviled both,
Regarded in both sycophantic and tyrannical aviaries,
It wants not for fodder,
The carcass of a republic lies below,
So it rends at putrid meat no longer protected,
Picking at the scraps of the citizenry,
The flesh of a populace with potential,

Each wing of this beast is dyed an opposing shade,
One crimson,
The other a dull blue,
Battling over which part to gnaw at,
Even as they rot and fester,
But make no mistake,
Both factions are wings of the same rotten vulture.

Ammonite

A relic was rent from the Earth,
Petrified and earnest within,
Once contains life,
But now a coiled tombstone,
A vision of the past in each radial segment,
Oracular sights in each fossilised tinge,
Mounts and continents long eroded,
Behemoths lost to the dirt,

This ammonite,
This serpentstone,
Left stopped in time during a prehistoric dance,
Dull turquoise in a waltz with emerald and violet,
It’s a spiral reminder,
To a time long gone,
A time before the modern plague descended,
Industrial ages stealing the Earths future years.

Warriors End

Among those fearsome boreal raiders,
When a warrior falls,
Respects must be paid,
For a warrior to rest easy,
Like a toll to the reaper,
A gift to the hereafter,
Like any legendary fighter has a moniker,
A warriors sword too has a name,
A hero in its own right,
And like any partner would hope for,
It was interred beside him,
The warriors sword was bent double,
Granted a warriors death itself,
And covered in the same graveyard dirt,
To lay still in the same valhalla.

Bundy

Evil can rest behind a smiling face,
An amicable face,
Even a handsome face,
Charisma is the tool of a monster,
Just as a blade or garotte,
Yet more savage,
More cutting,
That was Ted,

Too many souls taken in by a friendly smirk,
A mask hiding thoughts of violation and murder,
Sugared words upon a serpents tongue,
Caught too late,
Highlighting the fell reality,
That fiends hide in plain sight,
Psychopathy cloaked in friendship,
That was Ted.

No-Go Zone

I find myself too close to the frontline,
A contest between two flags,
I see flames encroaching on the horizon,
The heat grins upon my cheeks,
Scalding like impending doom,
These highlands are a no-go zone,
A board game too close to a fireplace,
The stage of a ruinous romp,
The two flags converse here in mushroom clouds,
Talking points at destructive decibels,
Airstrike arguments,
And howitzer handshakes,

I dare not linger,
These men in high castles care not for the little guy,
They propel uranium darts at this wasteland board,
Collateral damage upon their tongues,
Before kissing above the carnage they wrought.

Submarine

Death haunts the depths,
A manmade shark,
A machine of war fathoms down,
In the cold below,
It is on the trail of prey,
A cyclopean eye guiding the way,
Stalking those unaware seals of steel above,
Merchant ship or frigate,
Following the reverberations of their iron lungs,
The word is given,
Doom is silently unleashed at knots,
And once the hunt is over,
And the prey is scrap metal,
Fade like orcas into the dark.

Stories

Stories are kept upon a knifes edge,
Stashed in libraries laid on precipices,
Entropy claws out at them,
A howling void that knows only hunger,
These repositories are locked by closed lips,
The only keys are held by our elders,
To be passed down father to son,
Matriarch to daughter,
And as the adage utters,
Each time an old man dies,
The library of Alexandria burns anew,
Pillaged by raiders of time,
And the stories are gone,
Wisdom lost to the pyre,
If not passed on by generational torch.

Post-mortem Photography

In that old photograph,
That two-dimensional coffin,
I see a different funerary rite,
Morbidity crossed with sentiment,
It retains a person as they were,
Holding their face from the rot,

The glazed and sad eyes,
The agape jaw,
The hands that’ll never caress again,
The erosion of a life,
Frozen in time,
Held in amber shade for eternity,

In grim contrast does it bring comfort,
Seeing that revenant of a life,
It’s a posed denial of entropy,
That grainy image,
It’s an icon of mourning,
Memento mori.

House Of Relics

There’s a house on a river,
Tan and gothic in aesthetic,
Accompanied by a grand clock,
It’s a house of relics,
And I don’t mean antiques,
Red and blue in blood,

Sat along benches feigning opposition,
Breathing naught but dust and hot air,
They pass edicts destroying millions,
Guffawing and cheering like children,
Starvation and poverty are the gifts they offer,
The serfs shall be happy with crumbs,

They’re despicable little men,
Fat cats in silly wigs,
A deceitful gentleman’s club,
Just out for their chums,
It seems they’ve packed this flophouse out,
The house now only holds whispers of fraud,

You may ask,
Has honesty ever graced its halls?
Well there was this one Guy called Fawkes.