1. Franz
Six billion single solipsisms
Each screaming simultaneously
As squall of soul madness
Presses against case,
Iron exterior tinged with blazing copper.

Baby Franz cries ‘Mutter!’
Yet cannot crack the shell
Of iron, some early iron
Submarine sphere where
Inside, the leaks tinkle around
The interior, and Franz’ cries
Can only shift the complexion
Never the structure.

He gusts and blutters and
The copper flames only flicker.
Squally white souls, apart,
Pull foreheads over eyes
As millibars mount together,
Pushing eyes to foreheads,
Closed with congestion,
Only nibbling is left unhindered
As the tumour-cloud swells,
Teeth sliding over engorged gums,
Predatory ferocity sustained,
No sight but self,
No sound but self,
No feeling but self on self,
Baby Franz cries ‘Mutter!’
But he was born from self on self.

2. Franz the Pirate
His seeth changes piece
By piece and each melts out
From the nothing of the last,
A helm found in swirling Ash,
A change for the shoulders down,
For slashed and splintered eyes
Roll in salty beads down cheeks,
Not tears but relief because, when
Stabbed the body dies
In true tears through wounds,
Red gash cries.

And his seeth changes piece
By piece, outer waxing ever
Tighter around gunnels packed
With proofing cloth that grows and rots
With searing coughs of true tears,
Burying into the clouds,
And held down
By his sinking nothing,
Like an anchor dragged,
An anchor ever deeper dragged
On the rocks beneath the waves,
An anchor that can never change .

1. Aside:
Franz’ timbers shiver,
His cross bones shake.

3. Franz’ Face
Franz’ face, alabaster moon,
Fork scrapéd and presséd to bust,
Gears gunning indiscriminate,
Stretched skin qua skin,
Skull qua skull,
Smile qua skin and skull,
Eyes qua eyes,
All begat to light by the worms
Mrow, maggots who gestate.