poem poetry – Page 15 – poems 2 die for

SPECKLE

whole life I have been
looking for refuge
looking
for consolation

refuge from so many things
better not innumerate
bore you
waste your time
with a long, long list

but as for consolation,
have sought it everywhere
in art, in poetry,
consolation in fiction
(and yes, Boethius) consolation
in philosophy

but above all
and below

it is you
I have sought, thirsted and
hungered for, dreamt of
prayed
night and day that
if only

sought each little tiny consolation
that you might give

in every (almost invisible)
significant speckle in
your
dark, dark skin

GALLERY

stumbled, bumbled
into the gallery

snooped around and then
it was I saw you thick
with the rest of your coterie

thought it was an artifact
or small item of sculpture
that you were fascinated by
that
had seduced you

but then I realized
classic metaphor —
was a genie
stoppered in an
ornate bottle no
cheap container for wine,
no not at all

so you were all acting so
superior, so artistically
enlightened
that I grabbed and
smashed the bottle

let that genie free
for they do suffer, do
tend to fall foul
of imprisonmenf
these magical
poets, artists, writers who
cannot help but
display
as altogether different
quasi spiritual and
supernatural beings

and thus
my special wish
and emerging friendship

as we
made our way together
out of the building

laughing at
the poetic justice

how wonderful it is
when it
just so happens

as they battle with the thought
of eternal confinement

at least
they have so much
time (if not
space) for
self-exploration

and a ready, captive audience,
for all that beautiful narcissism
compelled
to share

ELEGY

ELEGY

Sorry
your poem
got
gunned down

could not help myself
just had to
missed all my shots
reloaded
missed all
but one
hit you in a foot
slowed you down
then riddled you

start to finish through and
through

yep
suddenly came over all
sociopathic clown touting
AK-47 and .5 callibre
Desert Eagle

Oh poem
of yours

feel so bad about its demise
feel so bad
sorry for you

bad
as it is

will write it
a beautiful elegy
(best my meagre talents
will allow).

RIVER

sailed in a boat
up the river

could have been
the Congo, the Amazon
or the Nile

was singing songs
to myself, Beatles songs
since they might help
me feel sane
and safe
keep
my spirits up, stay
civilized

for as the serpent of rivers
coils and uncoils
no telling what these
waters hold in
store for me, or I for
these waters
the chatterinv shrieking of
all manner of bird
every sort of strange animal

a kind of language
a fable, a warning not
at all translatable until
suddenly clarity
perfect sense
and there
is no return to
that sweet ignorance

you are so so close to the source
and start to
sense things

are a
part of everything

TALL

You have to love
irony

there you are laughing
at your crazy distorted image
in the crazy distorting mirror

until someone informs you
there isn’t nothing
crazy distorting
about
that mirror
at all

or you laughing out loud
about the tiny-mindedness
of Swift’s Lilliputians
when from
Jonathan’s perspective
it is
the entire human race
that is
(stretched to
full height)
but six
seven inches tall.

FOOTNOTE

What is
a politician good for?

was baffled by this,
but now
am entirely
flabbergasted

it’s the kind of question
after too many drinks
stuffing down a cheap
curry or
fish and chips

funny question to ask
and we have no better answer
than that given by
the Ancient Greeks

shocked at the disjunction
between political deeds,
political speech,
political ambition

and any
kind of philosophy.

AQUARIUM

She said that her star sign was aquarium.

I said that this
is such a coincidence,
since aquarium is
a water sign
and I am a fish

a flying fish
a salmon that can leap
in and out
of aquariums

bearing an amphora full
of cosmic energy

and if she played her cards right
I might be willing
to spare her

a sip

THINGS

Things crumbling
imperceptibly changing
and not for the better
all about energy and
closed and
open systems

but bear with me
there is dynamic, much afoot
some strange principle here
amongst all these
swirling particles

and yet
they are not particles
They have only the dream of a particle the whim of a field the thought of a spectacle yes bear with me this is going to be my slowest most considered most laborious poem the one that rambles on and on and on doubling back on itself out Wordsworthing Wordsworth

I guess this is the only type of
poetry genuinely left to write

this is my Solaris Mirror Stalker deep
and dark most Tarkowski of poem

oblique, difficult
conceptually
diffuse obtuse suspicious of words that hide what the carry within them

words that are hollow
resonate with the nothing
they bear within

this is me floating Sub-Zero
this is me looking where no one else has looked not knowing what we’ll be found this isn’t me stripped of human company empathising homing in on the suffering of others the pain of others
speaking dreaming the
dark night darkness we all feel the dream that coldly informs us
there will not be
an awakening

in the centre of the labyrinth
where sonething is there for us to
show (not tell) that
consciousness is meaningless consciousness is nothing consciousness is an accident at
the heart
in the nature of things

the broken
fragmented dark energy
anti-matter

frozen violently expansive imploding heart
of things.

RIGHT AS SHE BLOWS

Human rights
human rights

you have to squint
through a microscope

to get the gist of where
she is coming from
in her text
on human rights

Oh my humongous Suella
Sulla Braverman Braveheart

you will stand by your principles
fight for them lie
for them
kill and almost
die for
them (not
really, but it rhymes)

and rhyme is good
and euphemism too
and repetition
a zillion times

uncovering the frustrated
inner poet in you
(not that you would
ever stoop to elegy
not
the job of
Home Secretary)

to bewail
lost migrant lives.

MEDIAN

the medium is
the message

but I am out
have exhausted my
stock of words

wish
there were
a word store

or way
to paper over

seems
all that material
all my fresh and new
and vital truth
has simply
been recalled

and I must scratch and scrape
until my cortex bleed
to remember
anything at all

poem is what it is
does what it does

how difficult to talk
that talk

laughablle
to define
(been like
that since
the start of time)