Excerpted from VISITORS FROM THE RED STAR, by August Smith, via APOCALYPSE CONFIDENTIAL PRESS. Available now.
Swinging Half-Rainbow over Immensum Fragorem
France, 1554
TO THE ILLUSTRIOUS, HIGH-BORN AND
ALMIGHTY LORD CLAUDE,
DUKE OF TENDE,
on the first of February this year,
my Lord, according to reports received,
a horrible, unearthly sight was seen
above St. Chamas by the sea.
a fire did come from east to west
a burning staff of radial flames
as though mid-forge by heavenly smiths,
aglow within the starlit frame.
its tail did warp the sky for hours
the clouds became as glimmering coals
then arcing through the late horizon
this iron snake, this stained-glass scroll
did scatter shapes upon the verdure
each a glistening, rueful eye–
perhaps this was a godly gesture,
or conjured from some dev’lish mind–
your subjects beheld this on the banks,
my Lord, ensorcelled by its charms,
such terror tongues can not describe
nor faith secured in your gendarmes.
I cannot say just what this means, my Lord,
though I predict we’ll understand anon.
and so I pray for your good health and cheer.
your seer,
Michel de Nostredame
Celestial Phenomenon over Nuremberg
Germany, 1561
draining shapes in glass
lightning. training ships. dark fish
in the medicine barrel. confetti
mixed with oil in the offal barrel.
every man is an ape
of several shapes. every poor
an apocalypticist. the rich
stimuli of scattering objects.
no one believed the man
who discovered germs.
when the sun swung
her red scythes
like ten billion parentheses.
and the sung slid
into the pentagram’s firmament.
when crystal shapes
foamed warnings of evil
at the base of the cloud.
battles resembling celebrations.
you squint at something daily up there.
then the tanks break through your wall.
then bombs heat the air to plasma.
then snorting your fears through a candy straw.
you’re just filling the lines with red crayons.
clockwork voices in the air
outer peace
question number one
repeated, answering itself
with itself.
We Organized the Debris into Piles
I wanted to begin: there was once
a time. this is no longer possible.
but there really was once a time
when we began poems that way.
when we left footprints in the ice,
freed its sterile, stinging scent,
and scried the moldy runes
like drafts of an endless scroll.
bones struck by moonglow,
tuning forks trimmed to mystery,
nature spirits and sky beings
interphasing in the garden beds,
our houses crowned with moss
and sheep dung, hung by creeks
that teemed with fish of ruby-flesh
the breadth of fabled fiddles.
the night sky changed by rite.
a chalice of sand to blinking stars,
a quiver of pings to space and back,
brooding beneath a fake zodiac.
we fused spyglasses to our homes
and attached them to computers
and the computers to guns
and to the best guns we affixed
a little picture of ourselves.
we watched the creeps congeal
at the property line, exhaled
in sharp relief, and squeezed.
the moon stopped symbolizing.
our movies opened in the middle
of a battle and closed in another.
context for violence was indulgent.
there was once a time, though,
when stories made a musical sense
and meaning oozed from pain.
a plot has sutured shut the wound.
— August Smith is an artist in Austin, TX. You can interface with his songs, games, and even more UFO poems at: http://augustsmith.net/