1, poem, poetry, – Page 14

FOR ANOTHER DAY

never
want this poem to end

can swallow itself
carry on forever

this moment too
between us
could hang around
a bit longer

but even as
those words escaped

I noticed
you were on your way
alles klaar;
finished already

no way
to call you back
nothing I can do
to induce
you to return
to me

induce, seduce,
reduce, produce

looking
for the right Latin
verb to
Roman road your
ass
home to me

who
am sadly
so ghostly-voiced
long dead already

were
this not the case

were all
up and running, this
on the fly
a text I might change

be
your agent
active

tear up

this mess

write you one to replace
close to the bone
closer to
home

for another day;
made to measure

AH, PROFESSOR

ah Professor, Professor
your students
eschew reading

see books
(courtesy of TikTok
science fiction)
as things
wholly alien
set on
sublime modes
of mind control
even
devouring as
yet unwired brains

and some of these books
are fat tomes of sheer boredom
too heavy to
carry
impossible to read

unless you
mentally photostat
each page skimming
through them
at lightspeed

or have
the entire text
condensed

into
blue pill
or red pill

to crunch like a
jelly bean
flavoured to taste

SO FAR

so you were born/
cloned to
protect our crowning
achievement

our ability to
split the atom release
planet destroying power

which have become
so widespread every
nation, family,
individual
owns at least one

bare minimum
essential for humanity to survive

for without
fear of mutual destruction
what might
keep us civilized?

to destroy everything
wipe out one’s neighbours

every citizen across
the globe’s inalienable right

testimony to
the vast advances
in wisdom and knowledge
we have made so far

FOLLOW

I write
streaming live
scarring myself with
every pen stroke
as I do so

inadvertent self-exposure
sheer torture

navigating a ball and
chain spiked Medieval landscape
(how the dark
moments in our
history
cannot wait to return!)

what started as
cosmic irony
back-sliding, mutating
(openly) into
cosmic horror

as in
painful slo-mo
text allows itself, demands
to be weaponized

as was always threatened
as we started to think,
write, talk
in this most unforgiving of ways

as you walk
around me here
monitoring my footsteps
desperate not
to appear as some or other
poor
lost soul

and yet
you can take this anywhere
fly away
with whatever message
gleaned
or just follow

APPARENTLY

apparently
I have atoms
from
different
stars

my whole body
composed from
different galaxies

and your body too
those its configuration
nicer, sweeter
than mine
(though in truth
I could not be more
positively prejudiced
in holding
to this perception)

and atoms we have
I have you have

that with mathematical certainty
though we never
so much
as touched
(let alone
made love) came
from
belonged
to
the other

which atom
of yours I would
love to
find

truly love to find
try to figure out its role
in the
love that
I feel

love
in this poem

COINAGE

if there is subtext here
it is hardly subtle

the eyes of the satirst:
nothing sees
better in the dark
sees better the dark

and you caught her
fair and square
in the cross
hairs of
your sight

saw
what you saw
and instinctively leathered her
(while others
will lather, sepia
tone, pastel shade

wave the wand
of innocence, swear
by the book
and flag)

a coup
to catch it
tight in the vice like
grip of one who
has form
here, whose reputation
precedes, projects

irresistible the
gravity
pulling together

a grip
so strong it
will never fail, never
let fall, as (ahem!) it
did
with all the others
promises to
high heaven not withstanding

Yes, those pants
so hot and well spied
(this the
killer pen
can scythe in rhyme match
“couch” and
“debouch” in an
assassin couplet)

yet
picture so hot
the camera
flared
solid walls did
in fact buckle somewhat

no sweat
no sweat ring 911 we got

this
contained explained shame
upon us
all who
veer from
benefit of
doubt to insinuation preposterous

who
in time of
big lie, false
flag

do not in
the shock of
the satirical

take constant delight
true coinage of worth
savage solace
of the righteous

EARLIER TODAY

read my poem
read my flow
saw it
go

slow; fast-slow

slower, faster
than Andrew Marvell’s
“To His Coy Mistress”

pored over, read until
it glowed
became cataclysmic

went Krakatoa, erupted
like Vesuvius

as if just
to prove
you ain’t never read
a poem like this before

read
you got
you to read me
like textually can
be nothing
beyond
this logically

like we wake tomorrow
only to realize
there
is no tomorrow
wrong
on all counts
when we thought there could be

a fit ending
I might add

for this
insurpassable dovetailing
of poem and writer
writer
and reader

flush menage a trois
of everything
fitting
beyond perfectly

AND SO (THE DEATH OF RIMBAUD)

and so,
a candle
burns quicker

when fed
oxygen and absinthe

the latter best
not from a drip
or medicine dropper

if if is
essential
to preserve the mythology
of most favored
of fan favourite
precocious outlaw

Oh yes,
let us take a poll
on this side
those who
might suspect
the drunken boat sank
on this
those who would
steadfastly argue
it is there if you
would care
to search
for it
safe at its Seine mooring

but you yourself
were a veritable personification
of resistance to tethering

and now
no longer with us
bond boundaries and bindings
do appear everywhere

the colours of the vowels
have lost their
surreal charm along
with
former deep saturation

we
should take a plebiscite
to see if
in this impoverishment
poetry
might survive

and you so
word-
agile reduced to
a meme expanded
to an
entire semiotics

stuck in
some library
every
library

where they
got you to behave
taught you to dance

their dance
nuzzle and fawn

FRAME

am at a distance
am

at an acute disadvantage

wish I could steadicom
my eyes go
rack focus

crane shot floating
over and above

give you the one-take
tracking shot of
my every life moment

diegetic sound being
the beastly bustling buzz
and freaking
hubbub of
technologized time

for which screetch of
whatever wheels will serve
as slick
sufficient synonym

and here
we cut to

me at fast food joint (fabulous
community)

writing fast I can
as if looming shadow of
terminal extinction event

thing dipping
into Earth’s atmosphere
to turn
up the temperature
eat all that
luscious oxygen

gulping us
down
with it

as in
so many disaster flicks has
already gone
mega-cliche

damning any hope of that
movie that
heavenly moment
of moments

where you and
I playing
antagonists as ever

find ourselves in
and on
camera

perfect in
same frame