2016 6/30

(27.) RONOVE. - The Twenty-seventh Spirit is Ronove. He appeareth in the Form of a Monster. He teacheth the Art of Rhetoric very well and giveth Good Servants, Knowledge of Tongues, and Favours with Friends or Foes. He is a Marquis and Great Earl; and there be under his command 19 Legions of Spirits. His Seal is this, etc.

My house the dead house

the burned house on the weedy lot

black timbers shipwreck the mud

My book the dead book

pages brown with burst pipes

crawling with silverfish, with woodlice

ancient engines turn to dust

and scarecrow Christ rots in the dustmotes

of a locked house, windowless

my hand a dead hand

with black rimmed nails,

scarred, relentless

rough edged as a rasp, as a file

as a salt-eaten rocker panel

the widow's car, resting on it's axles

the dry-rotted foam of the upholstery

crawling with infant mice,

birds wheel in the open attic

flashlight glow of eyes in the lightening struck tree

the moon pooled in every leaf

My mouth a dead mouth

stuffed with gravedirt to bury you

with bent pulled nails, with tacks and woodscrews

dead tubes, transistors, flux and lead

my teeth are dead teeth

that break, and yellow, the gums drawn back

to the rotting bone, cutting torch and framing hammer

my black boots ring on your floor

leave grease wherever they go

hobnails and cinders, the calligraphy of all I have touched

In your dream I am a mouthless

giggle, a worm that swallows the sun

the rictus-grin of a drowned dog

black eyes of the rat in the trap

the cold weight of my touch

heavy as a malt sack, and cold

Like a bottomless pool of oil and gasoline

a cloud of gas in a crawlspace

a spark in a pile of rags

all my tools rust in locked dark

all the heralds of my homecoming