GENUINE

GENUINE

“Oh this isn’t a copy, this is it.” The Freshman (1990) (dir: Andrew Bergman)
           

could it be
a hypocrisy

to think
of this poem
as “genuine”
whatever
     that means

written
in free verse
stolen from others

needing to
be “liberated” absolute
prerequisite?

and so
     the question arises
raising its hideous
beautiful head

what to do
     with the rules?

with Robert’s net
we have removed
             trying to
define
    our own trajectory
less travelled path

keeping it
                rich

right words in right places
worthy of keeping
in the Louvre

behind glass
genuine,
        unless
there is a copy
we know nothing about

ENHANCE

ENHANCE

not enough
outrageously wonderful
stars up there

need some more
to stop it failing
as a spectacle

paint me, etch me
an additional few up there to
give everybody
in the galaxy
something to think about

we’ll keep it a secret between us
exactly what we did

no one else having the faintest idea
     where this brand new
Rigel, Vega, Betelgeuse
and Sirius came from

the more
     the merrier they
will probably say

not the great cosmologists though, their knickers
surely now
    going to get
             into a twist

knocking their careful relativity
space-time curvature calculations
uncomfortably cocked-
hat sideways

not their thing really
to find their all-
conquering physics suffering
a degree of
     unnecessary embarrassment
in the cause
of our natural human
creative desire
    for the ability to
transform and artistically enhance

GALLERY

GALLERY

I paged through my AI art
gallery
whilst you were busy
working at your craft

reports flooding in
of genocide and
impending nuclear confrontation
not enough to detract
you from your task
of penning the perfect couplet
and then perhaps, who knows?,
sky’s the limit
a further lifetime might well
need to be devoted
to the first draft of
what holds so much promise
of one day becoming
a most exquisite haiku

shining like a jewel, a gemstone,
amidst all the rubble
and detritus
of what we once were
a beacon of light
to draw us together throughout
the years of hard nuclear winter

perhaps
    tattooed on skin and
thereby passed down
through the meagre generations
of survivors
  more effective as message
that painting
sculpture
could ever be

which very idea I put to
my AI artist
     in a flash of
miraculous intelligence
bound
   to come up with something
a little off-putting since
still somewhat aliem

yet wondous nevertheless,
worthy of its place
in my gallery
    never
    to be seen again.

JOSEPHINE

JOSEPHINE

Josephine
I do not ask for your
cheetah
or your
anaconda

just let me
unpeel one two
three all
these dancing bananas

all eyes on you
as you mesmerize
me watching an actress
enact
   your story

the patrons, and yes
even the Gestapo
in the world
of the solidly real

but, alas!, not one
from that dream-factory
fairy-tale land
you managed
to scramble away from

the sky
is the limit

but you are what you are
if you be
            black or
brown (forever down)

Oh to be part of
if not your rainbow tribe
at least
  your menagerie

or have some role
some task
              that might
continue your legacy

touchstone for the power
of our human drive
to surpass ourselves

irrefutable argument
that we are indeed all one

ISLAND

ISLAND

the island
appeared out of
nowhere

popped up
all of a sudden
before
  pur very eyes

where we no longer
thought
an island
was possible

no longer
had any faith
in islands
a single shred
of belief

and yet
here it is
here it is indeed

Joanie’s stardust,
golden garden island
we have
   to get back to
(mpre music,
more fun
way better
than Shakespeare’s)

where artist Ai Weiwei
can come fix the landscape
make everything painterly
using best
  aesthetic primciples

a new Romer
a new Troy
a new Aeneas

an island
where we
can redo
history

miss
the terrible time 
to found them

bombets
sent to destroy it
simply
wished
out of the sky

islsnd
rushing towards you
at the speed of light

BUST

BUST

heard the good goog news
that they cut
the arts in
th-re-will-always
be an-England

big cities did it
because they are bankrupt now
and who wants
poems and plays about
terminal
   austerity

why should the State
or anyone subsidise
anything so irrelevant
trivial, spurious
as performance pièces
exposing this very hypocrisy
when money
is desperately needed
for jets and bombs

preserving the hegemony,
no time for idle hands,
wicked pens and
wasting
    all that is precious on
such self-indulgent luxury

nothing there worth
watching, listening to, reading

this is our absolute truth
to you
     there is no longer space
or capacity
they are
no longer part of
our identity
do not fit in
     our economy

we
are the final arbiters

we decide the colours, tastes,
feelings, shapes

this
   the realisation of our
special, almost sacred mission

to tell our culture like it is
close down all else for all