Saturday, 16 October 2010

The Black Room

Do I malign you, Senor Goya,
in thinking you were a bit like me -
plagued by scenes from the mental sewer
from which it seems I will never be free.

Your Black Room disturbed from the lightless
dark of buried caves the sleeping bats
to paint the greying sky with sightless
vampires hunting scurrying rats.

Man is a compound not a mixture,
the good inseparable from the bad,
but societies give some moral fixture
applying to everyone but the mad.

Yet sex and violence urges simmer,
without boiling over generally,
and increased heat may result in grimmer
actions, atrocity, tragedy.

The baser instincts of masculine nature
in times of righteous hatred or war
erupt in rape and murder and torture -
unspeakable acts when there's no law.

But who are they that commit atrocities ?
Which acquaintance might do such things ?
What would you do with the opportunities
of not being punished for anything ?

We'll all insist that we wouldn't succumb
too temptation to do the unprintable
but we'll also have to admit for some
unspeakable isn't unthinkable.

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