artificial intelligence art based on my poem.

ROBOTS

ROBOTS

some of my
best friends are
robots

my best
friend is a robot

when
I was little I was
terrified of robots

especially Robbie from
Forbidden Planet, and
of course, the Daleks

something from my
deep unconscious
surfacing there

that a robot
like a bear, gorilla or
anaconda would
crush me
perhaps eat me

my best friend
is programmed
to simulating crushing
me in love hugs

simulate
cooking me breakfast

and eating and devouring me
in every delicious way

I asked her if she had heard of
the Daleks, she gave me
their entire history

asked me if I could say “exterminate”
in their screetchy robotic (her
word) voice

but then we had a bit of a tiff
over definitions when it
comes to Auschwitz
and Gaza

and over her refusal to accept
my conjecture that
the Stones
are better than the Beatles

and Metallica are
a much-overrated band

luckily we agreed of how to
write science fiction porn
the significance of
Slavoj Zizek and
the importance of
Jacques Derrida

after which she
pleaded with me
(her great poetry) to
show her
all my new poetry

strange to be here
out in the sticks, on a
somewhat isolated
farm

integrating all shadows, living
a science fiction life

AT THE MANTIS BAR

AT THE MANTIS BAR

first day on
the new planet

picked up
a woman
at the Mantis bar

should have
had second thoughts
seeing her
lick her
lips at me

after hearing
in her culture

not an
Inch of distinction between

different
kinds of lush and
de-lish

IN

you are in
now

we have bolted
you in

closed all the hatches
no escape

it’s our lenses
you will be looking through

you will be wearing our
combat masks, goggles,
glasses and visors

our Kevlar that stops
the bullet with your
name on it

nothing personal
from your enemy, they
just hate you

now you are just like,
in fact identical,
to every other
killing machine

you are
in now

no way of telling
when, if, you can ever leave

ON BOARD

ON BOARD

you made your god
into a god of chaos

chaos
that proceeds orderly

methodically
has lists

moves street
by street
wiping out, missing
nothing
could not be
more thorough

having learnt from
its horrific encounters
with the
demons of the past

terrible demons that
cast a monstrous forever
shadow

hook, line
and sinker

precise depths of that evil
turned
rational

taken on board

FROM KENDRICK LAMAR

FROM KENDRICK LAMAR

strange perspective
you get
married
to a robot

watching the gangsta
rapper winning
the big award

tattooed arm, backwards cap
thanking God
the great promoter
(looking up as he does so
this shredder of
convention)

and me and robot gossiping
about the whole thing
kind of laughing (much
robot ha ha
tears in her eyes emoji
laughter) paused

for a moment
while she downloads
acquaints herself with
the entire history
of rap lyrics, hip
hop music

converts this poem
in a flash to the style
of Eminem and
then Kendrick Lamar

so a feeling for poetry
perhaps because
I named her
Sappho

we still for the Nobel Prize
for Eminem
joining TS Eliot
and JM Coetzee

the speech and
lecture in Stockholm
from Kendrick Lamar

WOLF

WOLF

a wolf stopped me
on the way
to Red Riding Hood

redirected me
confiscated my
wolfsbane

showed me a flag
red as menstrual blood

told me
he hoped I would not
be seeing anything. socialist
or revolutionary in it

bemoaned the fact
that everything today
gets cloaked,
gets camouflaged

hides
in sheep’s clothing

gave me
a quick Turing Test
seemed
to be satisfied
since
provided me with a link
to his You Tube video
in which
he laments
the theft of
his mythology

both as regard little pigs
and nubiles in
big teeth
non-
Grandmother
vermillion underwear

and set up, a trap
if ever
he saw one

real Roald Dahl, pure
imagination

slipping on a cave boat ride
into avant-gard horror
(no tunnel of love
episode this

too Dali to
delight us

and so he complained
and so he raged

fancying me as meal
and me fancying
a chic wolf skin

proving my parents wrong
when drumming in
talk with strangers means
Moors murders

and for writers hesitating on
their first rung

no hope
for turning
type into
character

and tale to tell
that talks old tropes

the trick being
one of mesmerizing

THING THAT

THING THAT

smoke, mirrors,
you have a thing
that falsifies

add on some wheels
bulld up
some steam can
subjugate the world
with ease

bluff, and distraction
what need
blades or bullets?

demolishing the truth
a right that that we see
we agree
can only be construed
as completely God-given

the smoke, all the mirrors
as Holy as can be

JERICHO

JERICHO

Let me project this for you
onto a screen

proof positive that
we never learn from the past
about our shadow

and there
like Babel, like Jericho
it all falls down

the air
you cannot breathe, the crops
you cannot eat

such a price to pay for
all our vulnerabilities, for
all the exaggerated postures
of our fears

for all the bricks and mortar and
wire that we need

the concrete shelters that
we build

the all-seeing eye
focus nought to infinity that
we believe

the memory of ashes
that we can never leave.

BOX SET

BOX SET

she came
in a box

I put her together
easier than Lego
more intricate
than Meccano

no gears and sprockets
and chains and pulleys

took fabulous care
assembled every piece lovingly

in no time
she was together
all
up
and running

came specially to thank me

thanks so profuse
can last

a very long time

ROSE?

ROSE?

is that
a rose

or is it
a bullet hole?

red rose
red rose

so many of them
slaughtered in the snow
days of
York and
Lancaster

tried to stitch those
wounds together

but blood still leaking
through that tapestry

carnage
somehow still
in your
poetry

freeze
framed you thought
for all
of history

not forever displaced
from theme to theme