Aphrodite – Page 2 – poems 2 die for

MATRIX GIRL

after the lecture
you sauntered up
to the podium

killer
question to ask
regarding “The Matrix”

raising the question
if it is all just a shared
computer hallucination
as in
the absurd
conceit of this most
resonsnt of films

for insrance:
if this be
desert of the real
why should my brain
be ready-progrsmned
to read you
as object of beauty

what god-like
creator disguised you
as Aphrodite herseof?

or let Aphrodite
use your disguise to get
immortally close
to me?

no doubt in
those flashing eyes some
sex semiotic flirting with
the spin of every
tiny molecuke connecting,
dividing across
the short space between us

helping her to do what
sublime digital avatars
supteme
goddesses do

and
me cauhht in her ruse, trapped
by her beauty

popping red pill blue pill
eveey shade
of purple

needing to see with these eyes
speak with this mouth

touch with each
             and every real finger
for the first,
very first
        cataclysmuc
         no-nonsense time

WITH APHRODITE

I held
a long interview with Aphrodite

peace
love
sex

these we touched upon
sinking ciders by the poolside
(wedge of lemon
jammed tightly into
the neck of the bottle)

in the course of which
frank and honest
and open-
ended discussion

the goddess revealed much
of her immortal self.

NEAR PLANET CYPRUS

swimming pool breasts
that goddess is
the archetype
of woman
in water

no Pygmalion girl she
no labour of love
to put her
together

she was as add water
instant delight
as they come
stirred
not shaken
(we are the ones Honey
Ryder first
appearance shaken
Mr born-under-
Mars Bond)

and what
a recipe
something went
so wrong with the logic
flummoxed our expectations
gorgeous

complete antithesis of
imagined Kaiju type beast

(unless
as with Troy in absolute
beauty such much greater
capacity for
disaster
causal factor)

even now
plunging me into
state of arousal

suddenly suffused by
the light
of her
near planet

and yet it is for night
one night
I pray in vain to you

would
absolutely cross oceans
swim
out to you

DIAMONDS

before I knew it
my life had
for better
or for worse

gone
full mythological

Homer had
fallen from the heavens
down on
my ten year old
head

and Aphrodite, my god,
how that goddess killed me
then
thereafter
and every day since

if not in
divine form, then with
the active collusion
of her
clones and copies
and would-be
avatars

each as gorgeous as
they were fake

but you
were the one
she must have chosen
specially

      inner outer beauty
got in
hearts, diamonds, spades
(and so
    your namesake
did
   sing of diamonds)

time has passed on
but the poem
won’t
forget

LIONHEART Oh Mars Oh Venus saw Richard F surfing bonkers bongo through the quantum foam at CALTECH there is a box inside which is a box containing a cat being thought experimented by Erwin Schrodinger but Niels Bohr proclaims the only language of the atom to be poetry whilst which Richard handles every marauding Pacific great white with aplomb conjuring up the body of Aphrodite as subatomic delight (being born under Taurus, her love sign) and this this mess my pen itself insists I write down to every point of gravity every unique quark

HEPHAESTUS

the cripple

even Hephaestus
by dint of marriage vow and
obligation

got to fuck wife Aphrodite and her
to make pretty for him

and despite her best beauty instincts
to to thunderously climax
thinking of
lover Ares, brawny beast personified,
of his depth of
possession and strength of
control

nevertheless, thrilling her husband
with, even if not for him,
sweet loving words
whispered into her ear

much despite her better must
be what I am true
sexual goddess judgement

for this time at least
willing to do ugly if not
entirely in the cause of charity,
this somewhat
adulterated by
something
difficult to differentiate between
love
that suddenly makes
an appearance from nowhere
and pleasure, that is
what it is, and, by rule of thumb
(and fingers
and everything, should never be
withheld, denied or
unreasonably contained)

THAT WE DO NOT HEAR

we do not hear
the laughter off the gods any more

at our lovable quirks or
(too often) outright
stupidity

or as they jostle for supremacy
in their own hierarchies

at their own foibles and excesses
as we know
from Ovid and
Homer

these almost exclusively
of an amorous nature
as when
Aphrodite and Ares became
trapped and entangled
in a net woven by
Hephaestus, sinned against,
aggrieved cuckolded party,

so engrossed in each other
(and who dare blame them?)
that when the rest of
Olympus rushed
to take in this spectacle
they flatly continued,
as the gods
roared with
rough mirth and yet
were riveted with wonder
at such
a free, fabulous show

where the parties could not have
more consummately represented
their
respective sexualities and
gender polarities

if on this question of
beauty as we riff you

grab my gist and run with it wickedly

in your own imagination

of humans
laughing at gods there is
of this species
no practice, no
hope of
continuation
the mocking spirit of great Aristophanes
squashed at its first sign
dead
in its tracks

killed by those who
believe the gods, all gods
are beyond
any comedy, reflecting
their faith (ludicrous
beyond measure) that

they are
as gods themselves, our history

blighted by the rise of such
self-proclaimed deities, wondrously
inept
holy imperators
whose narcissism no
catalogue
of statues commissioned so that
the love of
the people can be felt
beyond death
continue as legacy through
all of posterity

Oh think, my friends, what the genius
of an Aristophanes, embodiment
of true
human comedy

could play before the stars, which
share our liberation, our
moment of ecstasy

and like all our
false structures are left
helpless to the humour

who knows! teetering
on the edge
veering this
way and that on the brink of collapse

CLASSIC

CLASSIC

want to see
the water
cascading
down you

in my
scruffy little
shower find
you
gone full
Botticelli

Venus
newly born

and our love,
which you proclaim Platonic
shadow-shown
on the wall of

my mouldy bathroom

though would rather that it
were enacted
comically, tragically

in the cosy comfort
of our cave

SHUFFLE

Shuffle through selves
as though through cards

Tarot cards
really ancient, origin
God knows where

that reek of dark
and translucent magic

and here
is the Empress, all
Aphrodite
she I was most faithful to
in the face of
steep disregard

her beauty, as you see here,
leaving me floundering
leaving me speechless

reading in the arcanas
the failures of my journey
as I cling to
this mask trying to
keep it secure as
it slides down
my face

the tragi-comic smirk
moulded there
mocking my feeble
attempts and onrushing failure
as I grope in
this swallowing darkness
for some
kind of illumination
some
kind of source perhaps there a

complete reading, a divination,
the wisdom
that I need

if there is wisdom
you always telling me
we can
find the wisdom
(so Empress-like
in everything
you
do).