Two Poems by Michael Ashley‏

Rising Demons

they are not red and muscular
but translucent and piss-thin,

they don't howl or scream
but sigh softly in my inner ear,

they take flight, not with a shadow
-bearing wingspan, but silently

their horns, like obelisks, push up
through the the earth

silver, plastic, painted in a factory
in central china, smelling of £land

if I were a lesser being I'd have shit
myself by now, instead I just smile.



Take nothing from the hatch

we have something you don't here,
a simplicity like open fires
and liquor hot down our throats,

the hole is filled with flesh
feathers, dead pigeons
a warm smile from close relatives,
a scribbled out paragraph
on the final page of long novel

the sharp edge of your elbow
cutting into my ribs,
eyes and teeth, a smirk
a snarl, your hot breath in my face.