The Knuckle Tattooed Pianist

Portentous pianist broke his fingers, snap
Splits Liszt sonata into boned fragments:
A syncopation of that which is ‘ere, o’er and true.
 
Snarling kettle spits at bandaged fists
Shotguns of steam pump a pugilist
Upper cut to his solo vision.

Kitchen wall surveyed by a stain map
Drips around bicycle inner tube
Deflated in the greased sink.
Turn left at the bedroom
Follows the stairs to skies of bird song.

Presence of music begins to fade, and
He wonders did it ever exist
Outside metronome rattling in his skull ~
Becoming butchered
By guillotine guitar,
To become no more than
Ventriloquist doll, constructed in factory
From bits n’ pieces of previous lovers,
Dead composers, guts, stitches
Ditches sewn together by wire.

On edge of town,
Farmers burn field stubble
Shops & graveyards ringed with fire.
There is music in the smoke and flames:
He strains to listen, to replicate,
To burn his house to the ground
Conducting the wind to steer
The blaze North by North East.

He knows my name
Understands how I got my name:
Would write a score for a life wasted, but
The cinema is only showing silent films
Scenes for voyeurs from another parish.
We turn into a scorched sun
And trace the footsteps of the lonely artist.

Come back swiftly
Or never come back.
Simply, as swifts seeking refuge.

In the hollows of your neck
My mouth carves purpled notes
A key turns slowly between your thighs
An ivory bone spasms in accelerando.
Angelic choir shy aways
From bark being peeled.

In undergrowth the pianist stirred
Tenderness of the glade
Healed his hands.
And he played
A song for us.