MISUNDERSTANDING
Yes, we did
have our intimate moment
but now
in the afterglow
we seem
to be labouring
under a
misunderstanding
talking to each other
as if every word
macine transcribed
into Enigma code
acting under
the erroneous assumption
that we
are somehow created
as divine reflection
and not
some extension of plankton
whose million
year evolution took
a pretty
ludicrous turn.
FRIDGE SYLLOGISM
my cats, great philosophers
that they are
assure me
that inside my
old fridge
it is
pure utopia
a Platonic communist state
jam packed with delicacies
for all
felines
to share
each according to their need, and
power to irrutate
and I, for my Sins (all of
which pretty mortal), have
five of
them, one Socratic,
another Nietzschean and the
rest undecided whether
to follow Slavoj
Zizek or
call themselves Arisotelian
masters (and mistresses) of
the art of the syllogism
each of these
little logicians
expert at reasoning
and so would you be too
if you believed for a moment,
as cats indeed do,
that we
are blessed with
a modicum of rationality
if not an entirely rational species
whose yes/no, valid/invalid, true/false binary processes
can be read off their faces
and exploited to
ensure the
keys to
that aforementioned
paradise are not
left entirely in human hands
AND FIRE
Suddenly the sky faded, went
watercolours
turned blueberry ripple
as
at that end of the spectrum
they flowed into each other
all those short
wavelength colours
in all their pastel shades
or maybe not suddenly, maybe
I might have been
distracted and missed
the entire
sequence
the transformation as
it progressed step
by tiny step
and so
mystified by the allure
of all these blue -mauves
I let my fancy,
for a moment,
run away with me
taking
a serious bet with
higher powers
that Angels on bicycles
would shortly appear
miraculously pedalling
through the lilac clouds
not to
be likened to, or mistaken for
military drones
loaded to capacity
with all that they need
to turn
everything moving
to smoke and fire
MOVES
rotten at
chess puzzles
hopeless
at Rubik’s Cube
have such trouble
with all your
straps and fasteners
near clear skies
and an ocean
that is
a millpond
to set sail
and make my
killer move
SORRY FOR
Sorry for pulling you
out of the world of your smartphone
if only for a moment
to scroll
through these lines here
reading this thing
history will decide
is not
even a poem
presuming that
there will be history
and that world
outside your phone
but now
contained immediately
inside it
goes full Dr Stangelove
full we’ll meet again
total exchange nuclear
messing with
the service courtesy
end of the atmosphere.
LET ME
let me
make you
my masterpiece
a love portrait
to bring out
the ecstatic
best in you
painting
to the limit of my artistry
pushing
the envelope
of my craft
using this simple, humble,
custom-designed brush
LONELY PARK
am here
I am not here
my five cats
assuming I am here
which is
existentially reassuring
sunset on its way
three of the five felines —
Twinkle, Sasha, Panda Buddy —
scouting around me
powerful it is
this shared animal connection
assumption of presence
drums threading their way
through the village
seem to need
to find me
thumping bass
possibly from
the same location, same direction
hard to
get a
fix, judge
the distance
there is
always distance
am here
am not here
fit in
I do not fit in
am loved
I am unloved
am sort of loved perhaps
almost entirely
just sitting here, settled
my little room
getting cleaned
behind me
minding my own business
that business being
scribbling ideas
for the final scene
in “Demolition”
the novel I am writing
the world
turning
observing me minding away
curious about
the nature of
this final scene I do
believe
will clinch everything
scene in which I sit
pretty much as I am doing
right now
watching the world — if
not my world —
fall to pieces
BOUNDLESS
I am boundless
big boss predator
at the summit
of the food chain
extravagantly remunerated
on account of
my hunting skills
as if…
but if I were
the immense wealth
I possessed
how I would
deploy it politically
throw it around
get you to
cheer, and now, and
beg and scrape
and recite
praise poetry before me
no other sound
RED SHIFT
I am
getting
red-shifted
stretched out
and with this insane
elasticity
the laws of physics
laws of human society
changing
as space time itself changes
as idiots
get stretched out, magnified,
find themselves
in positions of power
owing everything
to entropy, to the twenty
first century
media miracle
of slavish stability
sitting dumbfounded as
it all goes to
shit around them
yet not
quite dumb enough
to go down
with the ship
easy exoneration
one of the true, necessary
blessings of absolute power
this red
shifting me beyond
the old
degrees of
acceptance this
practice requires
SNOW ON THE SAHARA
snow on the Sahara
crazy
as it sounds
were once grasslands here
far and wide as can be seen
but these
just niceties of
the catastrophic model
desert encroaching further
scurrying as we speak
through the Sahel
and we
forgetful children of
near extinction
walking products still
prey to aftershock
but
memory is blessed here
will edit out such nightmares,
annihilate them
leave us
suddenly sure
primally certain
boundless of being
never again to lapse
into
find ourselves
at the mercy
of uncertainty
sifting the signs
to remove
portents, omens
look only with eyes
that see
kaleidoscopically
snow
on the Sahara, need
to be there to see
poems 2 die for