SWITCHED ON
Switched on the TV
but it was the emergency
channel
sirens blaring
where I thought
Tony Soprano
would be
outside the sky
looked ordinary,
nothing special,
dull blue,
straggles of cloud
not the wondrously
horrific spectacle
I was convinced
our last ever sky
damn well ought to be.
THREE BOOKS
there are three books
any of the three will
provide you with a basis
for understanding everything
even though
they are so different
don’t say
the same things
at all
there are two books
(three minus
one
is two)
either of them will
provide you with a basis
for understanding everything
even though
they are so different
don’t say
the same things
at all
there is one book
(two minus one
is one)
even though
it is
so different
it will provide you
with the basis
for understanding everything
even though it doesn’t
say the same things at all
even if
no books
may just be better
than one
THREE BOOKS
there are three books
any of the three will
provide you with a basis
for understanding everything
even though
they are so different
don’t say
the same things
at all
there are two books
either of them will
provide you with a basis
for understanding everything
even though
they are so different
don’t say
the same things
at all
there is one book
even though
it is
so different
it will provide you
with the basis
for understanding everything
even though it doesn’t
say the same things at all
NOSEDIVE
we nosedived
fell on it
like predators
as soon
as we heard natural
selection, survival
of the fittest,
categorized ourselves
into different classes,
different species
and subsecies
predators and
prey
highest to the low
THE TEXT OF YOUR TEXT
you texted me to tell me
that i must be delusional
not to believe democracy
is doomed, on its
last legs
all that talk of
by and for the people
already well on
its way to becoming
laughably quaint
but
not so quaint or genteel
the armoured personnel
carriers full to the brim
with paramilitaries
screetching to a halt
pistols, automatic
rifles at
the ready
primed to debate
the finer points of political philosophy
CRIME SCENE
those faces
so bright and happy
so ecstatic, Sun
everywhere
paradise
just
off the coast
beneath
the radar
who would have thought
could have believed
it was, is,
a crime scene
a bucket of horrors
kept closed
at all costs
Atlantic breakers to
drown out screams
out in deep dark space
they know
all our Disneylands
are not the same
the light
at its brightest
deadly radioactive
that cancer goes deep
beyond
gold mine deep
and where
those faces meet
off camera, off script
are
returned to shadow
show depth
much darker
have calculated the
evil necessary
for everything
but
hurry along, be
on your way
no
concern of yours
not your
crime scene
FLOURISH
with a flourish of the word
I joined an ideosyncratic one
for an icecream
thing
of which he be
the undisputed emperor
the sky above us
a sort of blueberry gray
to which
we could not
place in any
everyday spectrum
resisting both
Saxon and Latineate phrase
beside which fact,
everything sufficient unto the experience
HI GIDEON
hi Gideon
sorry you missing
all the action
this despite itself carnival
of idiocy targeting, amongst others,
you and all of your inclination
yep, death is a bitch
when life becomes surreal
phenomenal
is about
to follow a course
cannot but
shatter your established
sense of things
and worst of all
the release
of these hellscape files
has shown us
how close we
are
to final
denoument
not a thing to
be part of, and yet
for the spectacle, not
a thing
to miss
and, me
out in left field for
the occasion
(would that
you might have joined me)
great point
of vantage yet
clear target too
and all this
just came into my mind,
unfiltered, unedited
out of
nowhere
most unredacted thing
to read this year
ROCKET
rocket
sprocket
in your pocket
so this is the social benefit
of billionaires
of wealth creation
the utter beatitude
bounteous bounty
pushing the boundaries
of masculine sexuality
through
the ceiling
right through the shitosophere
out into the absolute zero
of everything held dear
RHYME MINE
turned over a stone
was expecting
a scorpion
found
a solipsist
expecting
a scorpion not
my totem
or taboo
in which case
should have
thought fish cusp
with ram
and asp
would have been apt
but as sepent kind go
I do like to flatter
myself imagining
I must, could
be a mamba
a syllabic or alliterative few
metres of snake
claiming you as mine
as soon as cobra eyed you
swept
you into my coils
bade you, forced you
to teach me
couplets
ever-steady rhyme
turned over a stone
not expecting
to make
acquaintance
poems 2 die for