ending – poems 2 die for

AS THE SUN GOES DOWN

if you not
elite

had better be
fleet
of feet

rhyme faster
than rabbit Marshall Bruce Mathers

as credits roll
and the Sun goes down

JASMINE

world tells me
it is
about to end

in the proces
of ending

pours me a porcelain
cupful
of jasmine tea

suggesting
that I do drink
it slowly

which I did,
sipping it softly
moment
by moment

taking to heart
this wise advice
its logic
decidedly not
lost on me

POET IN THE RAIN

the rain sizzles
poet splitters
a few syllables
dissolves, melts

flows somewhere
as liquids are wont to

meanwhile
(for a billion meanwhiles)
the cosmos carries on
business
as usual

same old laws
that birthed us, did
us in
upon which we
came to depend

unless
things changed, shifted gear,
found a different trajectory
whole new
direction

could
have fooled us

no one around to document, observe
no one left to tell

POINT BLANK

Oh Mr Point Blank
I see I have a brand new
archetype
from lover and
magician
suddenly am
become
crone

hunched, crippled
in body whilst
the mind grows sharp
as a scythe
brutally clearer

seeing our nemesis
exactly
long before it is
here

how by the twisted
logic of our being
what
it needs destroy

how
it unfolds.

THERE WE GO

SCOWL

SHRUNKEN VERSION

shrink me
carve pieces off me
cut me
down to size

reduce me
condense me
down
to single molecule

erase
all that feels it has to burst
its boundaries, explode, expand
be liberating
be transformational

yes,
slice the heart out
of all that stuff

kill all that is poet, poetic,
make the poem, the poetry
go suicide

once upon a time I clung
to the fiction
it was
my purpose and meaning

now
I am far too old
for anything like this
at all
at all

REVERSE GEAR TO THINK

road is tar
and economy

hole and
ideology

Someones everywhere
trying to follow
their roads
to their very end

and everything might be
cul-de-sac ultimately
(straat
loop dood in a
slightly more germanic taal)

hopefully you have the grace
not to mind my language

even as rubber
and aphsalt
chew
up each other

pedal to the metal and
concrete to the petal

me stuck in traffic can
safely presume I am
measurably not alone
in not
loving it

not noticing that the lights
had changed

anxious, Slavoj,
for the lights to change
someone
sitting with a sitar
at the back
of my head

reverse gear to think
this is a raga that will
colour the clouds
thus
colour
the
rain

ENDINGS

A DAMN

always
in a rush to
publish

sometimes I leave typos
all over the page

sometimea my
typos
themselves
have typos

sometimes I wonder
when I write

where the Hell
is the poetry
where
is that thing
the poem

not in the world
and apparently
not
on the page

maybe
I should go look
for it

maybe we
should all go
look for it

try to figure out
what the Hell
has happened to it

go
find Dante
he
being the
expert in
such matters

hear it
from hia own mouth
hear it from
all those
voices

the blessed
and the damned

how
small poetry has got
allowed
itself
to get

barred from Heaven
closed off
from Hell
lost
all its real estate
kicked
off its land

nothing big left
to talk about
nobody listening
no
imagination
inspiration

so just shovel that shit put
it
out there
have to
put it there regardless

put it out there
fast and
furious
wrap, drench
the world in it
before it dies
entirely

no time
to worry about
this and that
the dream
of certainty
delusions
of perfection

the time
for care
and concern
has all but
vanished
is long-
time gone

no worry about typos
lack of rhyth, rhyme
missed meaning
what
does not
scan

no one
gives a fig

no one gives a damn