Foonotes³

The Demon King
No stage, no solace,
Oh mercy, tresses and crusts, gems adorned, golden anklet, smooth wisp of caramel
	drifting down a waffle cone

He walks, footsteps as fire, sword of darkness at his side,
Lido take him.
Lido, cover your eyes and hold your arms up high, reach for the precipice, fall short

Lido shape him.
He sleeps under mushroom caps, the beast cross with mortal terror, toil,
Associations in oil, slick, hydrophobic in lubrication

It’s a beast kiss, Lido, the touch of another
He lays at cursed bay, building harmonies at the crumbling docks
And the waves come in, bearing garbage, poison, scraps and shards of tentacles, an epic 
	built in snow angels just 
	formed in the wake of fallout
And his feet, Lido,
Demon King toes touch Demon King lake, swirling in bloated brine, the venom 
	waters, putrid, a sickness

And the air carries.
The Demon King cries.
Tears fall down in parade, drums crash, cymbal shaking as it vibrates high and low
The feeling of overwhelming fervor
A sink’s response
His faucet dripping liquid cheese
	Bile, filth, the color of his poison eyes
There’s something in the water outside, the streams are clear, but they taste of scourge
He cups the bile in his hands, a soup between frail stalk-y tendons, lifts it to his mouth
	and takes it in—the taste of music

And the air carries.
Five hours til call time

He wraps himself in eaten cloth, moth-worn, steeped in threadbare cuts
He lies alone, along the bank, buried in the sand, the way he hears them—
Creeping bugs, seeking a peek, a glimpse, a glance
Four hours til call
Three hours til call
He’s lain in cocoon, poor cloth, the better part of two hours
Or was it one?
Time passes so slowly here

The Demon King
The king of what
His subjects given leave have left
The ones who stayed have worn away from flesh,
	To trees,
		Taken forms provided by a glimpse of silver light
He feels their breath in roots, hand’s pass over short rush, full breath, twisted wood, 
And in the way the bark splits—A name

A name loved sunsets, but A name only lived in the dark
The Demon King stands on a rock, projects himself into the glow of violet summer
Two hours until call, and he cannot bring himself to move
Eats dinner, marbles drifting, through the sand they find their way to the surface and
	get stuck in scuttling feet, one limb missing, one limb extra—modified crabs, I feel 
	them living modified lives in modified sand under purple-yellow poison sky!

Silver light
	It fills the Demon King with Dread
One hour til call
He packs his things, his wide-brimmed hat, those spiderweb loafers, an oxing fly, the crust of a crisp and tender powder ox—a sack, woven in vain—then he walks
Across the surface tension of the lake, to the waterfall isle in the center
Interdimensional plane-ride, the last flight out to the barren zone between voids, Between Layers, sections
Made out of salted earth, 
The City Of the Dead
The Marble Palace
Where, in legend, Satan himself once slept, a thousand eons ago, before they dug a new 
	city out of the ice and gave parliament a new place to smolder
Through the depths he plunges now, a falling star, mourning star,
To the fear that waits in the wings, 
One night, one more splendid night, last chance to see 
The Demon King’s Aria