Engine of Hell, by Emma Ruth Rundle (2024)

1.

A rich belief that no one sees youYour ribbon cut from all the fates andSome hound of Hell looking for handoutsThe breath between things no one saysAuthor of a Poor DesignNo one to steady your handAll things lost in their own timeWhere have you gone to?Return to meReturn againReturn to meReturn again, heySome demimonde astride the crossingYou’re reaching for a life-like faceYou stumble to the cellar door andYour fragments glitter the eyelids of a childAuthor of a Poor DesignNo one to steady your gazeAnd the things a pound of flesh can’t buyWhere have you gone to?To return to me?To return again?Return to meReturn again

2.

Judas come close to me Visit in visionsTell me the story of howyou swing like an actor in the greyest of gardensyour tongue hanging free from you mouthDown at the methadone clinic we waitedhoping to take home your cureThe curdling cowards, the crackle of chinayou say that its making you pureAnd just like Flowers for Algernonsomething's diminishedThere’s a love like you've never known pinned to your finishOne, two, six underfoot and you will riseAnd in all of your blooms of oblivion I love youSee?Maker, I'm close to you to deal your departure to make sure you’re nailed to the groundand all of the glamours, of treacherous traitorshave all run away from you nowI will stand over youto breathe in your vapor as pieces and parts, they dissolveYou plead you as failureYou wait for a saviorbut leave knowing nothing’s resolvedAnd we bring flowers from Albion up to your visionHold back the love that you've never knownyou've only this prisonStraight to the hangman’s noose, are we born this way?Handing down a fistful of sorries you will never sayI love youSee? Say

3.

Come if you’re abletears like the leaves fall downscenes from your tablewe’re moving the body nowSome silence has lifted you from a world unkinda shroud we have fitted a sick sad world that you leave behindbut I hear you say…“You know my arms are always around you”Moving the body nowwe’re moving the body nowA book, a pianogifts from the muse, in your selfless waymy teacher, my feederthis red hair’s going nowhere since you went awayI dream her, I see herThe softness of the hands I'm holding in my mindIf only I could keep herI'm still a little girl that needs you one more timeYou said your arms were always around meI’m moving my body nowjust moving my body nowthough I’ve been reaching outthrough all the years, and the years go bythough I can’t feel you now- still I can’t feel you near my sideI can’t feel your arms around meI can’t feel your arms around me anymore

4.

So loud, that the company I keep is just mineIt’s the center of my troublesAnd white is the color of the noise it’s makingAnd why I drink myself to sleepSoakDivideDeformDefiled, ISo quiet, the melody I sing that’s just mineIs the center of my troublesAnd life isn’t tethered, just a toll that’s takingAnd why I go to sleep to leave hereSoakedDivideDeformedDefiled SoakDivideDeformDefileEther’s way outThe soul is so much brighter now, without youEther’s way outThe soul is so much lighter now, without youEther’s way outThe soul is so much brighter now, without youMy whole life, some dark night, is so much brighter now,without youMy whole life, some dark night, is so much brighter now,without you

5.

time…sweeps…remembering youSpin in the garden, in roses not redPeach were the petals there insteadPoised in perfumes, anointed in blueThe orphans can smile for an afternoonKeeps a balance, my gentlest friend I know you from Adam, I’ve known youAll I’ve known of loveThere in summer and there again in springShoot me down ChinatownAnd you’ll wear makeup and I’ll hide my messThe urchins parade in their SundaysTear of Sodom and tears wept for TroyBut for you, friend, of joyI see you there, Dancing ManI knew you could singAll of your poetry All loveAll I know of love

6.

Spending all my money as the petty cash of youth runs outBurying my body but the dogs keep diggingLay around Lazarus, roll the stone - that I might feelJust enough for both of us to let me rise through the eye of the needleIf you have something left, don’t be holding outIf you have something for me, don’t be holding out‘Cause I’ll be dancing on the razor’s edge just to feel its powerTo be heathen in the gasoline for cheap heat of an hourI’ll be spinning like the girl in glass slippers at the last supperThere’s no need to check the weather as my winter’s never overIf you have something for me, don’t be holding outPass it to me honey as my sweetness and my lights dim downNumbing out nightmare but I just keep grinningPlay it down, Magdalena, no one knows that you've come undoneLooking down the mirror at the demon that I have becomeIf you have something left, don’t be holding outand if I have something left, I’m sure I haven’t found itBut I’ll be dancing on the razor’s edge just to feel its powerTo be heaving in the gasoline for cheap heat of an hourI’ll be spinning like the girl in glass slippers at the last supperThere’s no need to check the weather as my winter never endsI’ll be dancing on the razor’s edge thenI’ll be spinning like the girl in glass thenIf I had something left, I still haven’t found it If I have something left, I might never find it out

7.

There is a fortress in my heartI try to go there in my dreamaren’t any songs for me to singnot in the fortress of my heartHere comes the weight on me againbone by piece I’m bricking me overtier by tear, I wave to you…on my way downmost of my life I was trained howJust to lay downand never ask whyI was trained howJust to stay down where its safe now - safe nowThere’s a destroyer in my bloodwho's handed down and waits for meI have no air, I cannot breathwith the destroyer in my bloodHere comes the weight on me againbone by piece I’m bricking me overtier by tear, I wave to you…On my way downmost of my life I’ve been trained howJust to lay downand never ask whyI stay downwhere its safe nowam I safe now?am I safe now?Here in my citadel of selfI can be safe.

8.

Taken to task in some Engine of HellI lacked the toll to cross the river theresomeone forgot to put the sterling on my browGone from a world, that I might sailTaken to plow off this debt somehowSomewhere in the outer planetsI think that its cold but I'm not sure that this is my bodyI was robbed of my mask in some engine of HellI have a feeling that I might be here a whileyou might want to call in a maid to help keep you clean But I remembered all of your lines from lifeAnd told them to my keeperHe said that you were funny but a liarSome dark deceiver Some dark deceiver.Now I'm free drifting though Saturn’s debris things cut and floating through a blackness that never seems to endI think if I willed it, I could return homeBut the warmth of the sun, it has become searingI have a feeling that I might float here a whileRift and directionless, that I might spin myselfBut I remembered all of your lines from the livingAnd told them to my nearest keeperA distant star there was laughingSaid you were funny and now we’re freeAnd now we’re free.