Lid Off by James Roberts

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Lid Off

Hedged bets and
angst thickened air
clouds everything.

Like too much flour
added to gravy's fluids
and fats

Once the heat
is taken off
it will congeal

film over,
and begins
first the smell, and then the rot.

When despair and horror's
hot broths
are churned together

and left to go cold
with the lid off

they attract the buzz
of those who spread and feed on
rancid faecal matter.

This brew stagnated
will produce just

dead eyed life
glassy expressions

and bitter tongues
that lash their undeserving.

Turn the flame up,
before the poison rests

before it settles
and is
just
there.

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Bio: James Roberts is a writer and performer from Bradford in the UK. He's spent the last few years living in Russia and moving around Spain where he's written variously about political strife, the joy and pain of memory and finding dark comedy in the day-to-day. 

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