Tag Archives: language

FRESH FRUIT

FRESH FRUIT

On the farm
I wonder

about the ideology
of a tree

the entire tree:
roots, leaves, branches

cannot
escape asking myself
what haiku currently
courses
   through the flowers

Of course
    this is (dear reader, I
do recognise) a
category
   mistake
of the first order, and will
no doubt, none too late,
be brought
   to my attention amidst
much
  wild snarling

and thus forgive me
my contextualizing in a poem
how much theory
pervades
        everything (truly
it is in
its nature
    to be an invasive species)

and Fall and Autumn and
all those mellow feelings
much
   written about

some ode or other
      that leaf to dead leaf
is
  remembered

all the wherefores and whys
as to how
  this system getting greener
came
   not just
    to be but
into conscious being

ruthless and polite both
stuck in a rut this day whilst
supposed
    of infinite variety

and my voice
     estranged, coming back

to me alien

as if
   freshly arrived, in awe of
all capacity to
shift the
      word of perspective

see things differently.
   

VARNISH

VARNISH

he vanished
because he lost
his varnish

the gloss
fell off

end of the licence
afforded to clown face

debate now raging
openly, covertly,
between
    reflect
and refract

pitting the opaque
up against
the transparent

no space in this world
of everything hidden,
full disclosure

for the serious serial
beauty of the translucent

the mystery if the word as
it conjures killer fact

hard to
     live
         where condemned
to reflection, purity
of copy
     completeness itself

AND FILE

AND FILE

imminent
immanent

who knows
cares

what these words
                       mean?

whether they circle
each other in a loop

stand in
       series

rank and file

or jostle with each other
flex their muscles

or scratch like stones
giving
           sparks

birthing
fire

EDITORS

EDITORS

the editors called
them in
hectored them

told them that
to keep
the people down

we need
to keep language

he we she it all
they them

need to kill
the words
kill
   and liquidate
kill
   and paraphrase

topple words
from their throne
strip poetry
to the bone
(reduce it to a
sweet
    bare rhyme)

down
down
down

   kill and devour

reduce all
words to spit
and spume

our few
      true words will

hold all power
              and so
the unthinkable

can
   be made to think

and think
the death of truth to power

WE TOO

WE TOO

we love to
play the language
game
     we two do
come at greasing
the signifier
not
from different
poles  entirely

my games with sound
and sense
more about
      foregroundimg other,
difference, perhaps
a touch
     of deviance

yours
      (if I might
proffer
this distinction) about
what is established, believed,
holy ordinary,
  sacred same

how we can get
          the narrative to
go full
python
    swallow the facts
(crush in its coils any
                truth inconvenient)

and of course, after my little
pointless spiel
       boredom, dismissal
the worst I get

the guilt that comes
              with bad poetry

not, as in your case, if I
dare suggest

         every kind of sick and
unconscionable paid-for
complicity

that
     shades us into dystopia
thence living Hell

SYSTEM

SYSTEM

and now I find
and now I find

gymnast and
syntagm
     are so intimate

anagrams
of each other

spooky action
     at linguistic distance

but what do I know
of such unique connection

all my lovers
        ghostly, some
actual ghosts

the dust of all
    that was desire questioning
my stridence

gives the idea
     puts me on notice

that it is
                   all simulation

and when you undress before me
in name only

getting the sweet syntax
     up and running

see what you are up to here
Mr Shakespeare or
Earl
    of Oxford

whatever you wish to go by
privately call yourself

spilling from Juliet’s lips
the philosopical truth of
                    a true rose

even if
a thousand years of cynicism
scepticism stands in its way

when you
        go inexplicable mystery
and wrap yourself around me

making us (yes, channeling you
Professor Noam Chomsky)
branches, leaves
       upon the same tree

graft taking
      we can grow now together

happy
     (who would not be) though
this all
     feels pre-planned: our
perfect simulation

FARM TALK

FARM TALK

let me
withold words

surrender
poetry

thus may I
figure out what
the farm is saying
the trees speaking

catch
these voices
hitherto drowned out
by my insistence to
delve into
   the depth of my
faith in language,
human
     linguistics

so many different ways
of writing, talking out there