Jeff Bagato



The Eggshell Skull Rule

                                my tiny pill 
                        goes down
                 easy into an infinity
                                       of cell depth,
                            deep &
                                      down,
                                  slashing and burning on
                                               the inside
                     to create a homeopathic hole,
            a place for medicine
                                to stake its caduceus
                          in the heart of
                                               hearts,
                     the very bone
               of my bones,
                        the cell of my cells

                                 when birth is crystallized
                                            on birth &

                          the wrongdoer takes 
                 his victim as
                                he finds him,
                       shuddering now down
                                     in a hole,
                                                festering rainbow
                                          bile & porphyric calm;
                  the kindest cut, a tiny
                           cure all
                                    carving up a liver
                                in a quiet kind 
                                            of neverending
                                       piece



The Dark Night

                                                oh this dark
                                                              knight who
                    through his feets
                                    of war & woe
                                           keeps guessing
                            on Zarathustrian equations:

                                                          how one
                                        minus one makes
                                                  a dynasty,
                                                                        how
                       versus defines a hole
                                  culture, 
                                                               how cancer adds
                                                                               dollars to 
                                                                     the GNP,
                                                    how binary codes
                                                                        can reduce
                                us all to
                                    Helen of Troy & Paris
                          begging outside
                                                   the 
                                         gates



Code Within the Code
 
                              the cell squeals under
                     the knife, a cursor
                                        hacking away 4000
                                 letters,
                                                 deleting a name,
                           a destiny—
                                        2 genes gone
                                                 & a new beastie born 
                                under the microscope

                                      can you hear a future
                         singing brightly of
                                                new oils
                                    for food, fuel,
                                                        plastic & 
                                         other hydroponic
                                                             cure alls?

                                           sucking 
                                                  out the CO2
                               & fixing it to a new
                                                              molecule,
                                                 maybe clearing
                                     up the Gulf, 
                                                        a vacuum
                               for spouting smog monsters
                                                  & plumes of black gold
                                         too deep to reach

                                                           maybe 
                                converting the human
                                               breath to yellow gold,
                                    or flesh
                                                     to black gold that falls
                                         off the bone so
                                 nicely & scooped
                                                          like a tar ball
                                                                      to a bucket,
                                      to a pump,
                                                    to an engine,
                                          in a cycle of 
                                                               food flesh
                                                          & fuel

                                            after the test
                                tube priests have
                                              shaken their sistrums and 
                       waved their censors, their 
                                       whips, their wands,
                                   a bacterium jumps 
                                                          new hoops
                                                                      to serve
                                         mankind
                                                   after being
                                              taught
                                                          how to prey

Jeff Bagato is a writer, musician and street artist living near Washington, DC. Some of his poetry has appeared in Otoliths, Zombie Logic Review, Full of Crow, Exquisite Corpse, Chiron Review, Shattered Wig Review, and Open 24 Hours. New for 2016 is a collection of older poems, Savage Magic, revolving around a single character. Older poetry books include And the Trillions, Spells of Coming Day, and Latest Headlines.

He blogs about his writing and publishing at http://jeffbagato.wordpress.com.
 
 
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