murder on the gowanus

swell me a bowl
with lusty oil
brightest under bis
geynest under gore
 
ecce who com
inna persian vestment
                   un monodatal voll
                   marines cd not hoist thee
 
whose eyes go seaward   noreaster reeling
thrashing at the mouth of the gowanus
mischance upbrimmd
 
sludgie helas, aloft
sometimes honeysuckle can smell like MURTHER
 
              yr shining form to oil hath returned
              yr helmet now shall make a hive for bees
 
it was no dream   I lay broad waking
oil blossomed green, incarnadine
 
s/thing keeps
on testing me for tb
 
is politer not to talk about
beastly p.o.v.
 
ludic
like a succubus vomiting ivy
lordly subtler
grotesquerie
 
you can bet it smelled like murther
creped and crinolinnd along the noggin
w/ a victorian western pin
 
till I may see a plumper sludgie swim
everlike rotund
buddha—smack aghast
everlike leo and thir friends
marching in lockstep
to the sunlit uplands.

Copyright Credit: Julian T. Brolaski, "murder of the gowanus" from gowanus atropolis. Copyright © 2011 by Julian T. Brolaski.  Reprinted by permission of Ugly Duckling Presse.
Source: gowanus atropolis (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2011)