A Game of Gogol's Bluff, revision no. 4

[Brian Roberts]

Population Minus Zero

In the town of Brokeplate
the pleasures are few
dry lightning exhales
the dead and the lewd.
They dance up a gale
then stand in a gang
and scream at the night.
Flickering lanterns hang
from a gallows so bright
forming rainbows of hate.

Its church is bled static
where the decomposed sing 
and the town’s only whore 
sheds her skin every spring
while toads wait at her door.
Morse code has been banned
but the telegraph hums
at a scorpion’s command.
Feral hogs do sums
in a blackboarded attic.

The town boss is synthetic
made of scraps of lice,
bent aces and gin.
He shoots bullets of ice
at targets without sin.
His voice is like thunder
if only he’d speak,
but instead he just wonders
who is the real freak
and what is “aesthetic”?

The town’s main attraction
is an innocent cowboy
who rides in each ugly dawn
looking happy but coy
an unordained pawn
carrying flowers and a glow.
But the boss is a shark 
at the game of G0-No-Go,
cowboy’s eyes fall dark
without a moment’s distraction.

Brokeplate’s dysfunction
circles a western sun
a planet of recurrence
where reason is spun
out of occurrence. 
Cowboy is buried only
for fun, he’ll be back
tomorrow just as lonely
without hesitation or slack,
to meet at the junction

of sunrise and sunset
and that’s as far as he’ll get.

In the town of Perplexity

lightning creates thirst

play-piercing the complexity

of the patently condemned

who race to be first

to wave invisible limbs

and ward off the eyes

whose pupils are coyotes

lacquered with lies. 

Inside the Bone Char 

a pink neon saloon 

built out of blood-stains

of twilight and sin 

Candyman is relapsing

his face is collapsing

into four aces and a grin.

Outside in the street

his bullet-faced son

Cotton-eyed Joe 

traces hearts in the sand

and counts out the rings

of detonations and gin.

Candy and Joe run things

as they care to displease, 

keeping an elephant in the brothel

ant-hills up their sleeves.

Feral hogs keep the peace

church hymns sound like static

and the town’s only whore 

is one-eyed but not tragic.

Though morse code is banned

the telegraph hums

at a scorpion’s command

and it’s a favorite abode

for hangmen to gather

wearing fezzes and robes

they dance the Hereafter.

If you want to tune in

to this alchemical age

sharpen your lips

and curl up your rage.

Smoke it or snuff it,

it’s all up to you

but the cemetery is off-limits

to all but the few

for a recipe God only knew

special ingredients

for slumgullion stew.

tqb,
I enjoyed the rewrite...I do wish you could have salvaged some of the lines and images of the first draft, however. You haven't foregone the surrealism, but bridled it in a sense.
Now its structure is decastich, I believe, save for the ending couplet. The cowboy has become the central character, the lines before his appearance a sort of portend. I can appreciate the new format, but, for me, a bit too much has been shed(for clarity, and effective). I will read again and give you a better critique......sorry this one was shabby.