STEALING HEAVEN FROM THE LIPS OF GOD

(Or “How To Succeed At Living”)

Strip the lids from sleeping eyes
And live in sunlight forever more.

Peel the skin from your bones
And let the acid rain dissolve you
Into nothingness.

Become shaman and seer,
Visionary & voyant:
Risk lunacy.

Descend from heaven
And be born again
From the scalding vulva
Of Sheila-na-Gig.

Burst rainbow placentas
And dance on the operating table:
Shake the scalpel
From the surgeon’s fist.

Steal fire from Prometheus
And spit in the eyes
Of scavenging birds.

Be carrion for Pan.

Fuck till you are beyond fucking.

Drown in your own juice.

Die and die and die again:
Die little deaths,
Die big deaths,
Die cinematic extraordinary deaths.

Deify yourself:
Cut fresh stigmata
In random flesh,
Rub sulphur in the wounds.

Be a tiny thing
In an open space.

Become Christ:
Allow yourself
To delight in pain.

Enter love’s threshing floor
And ask for more.

Sing with the sirens:
Rescue sailors
From brutal rocks;
Be a lighthouse.

Turn yourself inside out:
Scream till your lips bleed
And your ears echo
With eternal tinnitus.

Ride freight trains
Till your bones play the blues.

Phone the time
And hang on
Forever and ever.

Leave flowers
On the graves of strangers.

Shoot your television.

Grow old
Gracelessly.

Be impudent.

Embroider your tent
With the names
Of everyone
You wish you’d slept with.

Burn all your money
On a beach
At sunset.

Break wind
In polite company.

Rave on!
Dance to the rhythm
Of your heart.

Allow the snake
That swallowed your elephant
To masquerade as a hat.

Borrow some colour
From your children.

Become employed
In a strange occupation.

Find a road
That’s never been travelled.

And always quit
While you’re still ahead.