FLAT
sweet iced tea
booze chaser
from T S in vogue
to Charlie at the bar
my, how
time flies
and way
we classify
smoke with
every breath
bourbon splash
sometimes pancakes
are all a reader needs
syrupy
ever do sickly
way beyond
definition of flat
POEM FOR HELEN NATASHA
tough love
cruel to be kind
but let mention she
who needed to win
most of all
see her favourite’s name
up in the city of lights
Achilles slain
the towers fallen
she who was raped
less than harmoniously returned
and who, being man,
being man born of woman
would be so
out of his right mind
to vote
against her
spurn that offer
she flirting with the idea
of full divine disclosure
revelation
of that so in utter excess
of mere mortal beauty
mere legendary
beauty of
a Spartan Queen
straining against the bit
holding back unless
her hero
lose his sight
die sublime
kind to
be cruel
cruel to be kind
OVERNIGHT
I am desultory chicken boy
coming home to roost
chaos joker dancing
in the pale moonlight
anarchic fellow
crowing long before the dawn
scarred I am
my features are
sacred beginning: crashed
the party hurtling headlong
headfirst
from the boot
of your cab
bouncing off windshield
back into the Underworld
life in your
luxury lap to
utter amazement of all
my Queen of Hades
dancing
to inherit the Earth
cocksure
this is the life that was meant
Herr Will-to-Power
these the roads most
follow
to dig up
overnight
BALL
ball rolled down
a chuté
shot out
a spring
sure
thing
and me Mr Uncertainty
only ever
graduating to
Professor Still-
in-Doubt
Oh that clockwork
chocolate marionette soldier
holding the line
never
breaking ranks
when the ball that the Universe
let itself be scooped
into
enters our system
collides with
our planet
will all or gods confer
debate pooling their powers
the Sun sad to see
any of his vast circle
of siblings and
children
summoned and judged
assigned the fine
hairline
cosmic justice of
planned
extinction event
LIGHTLY
dove flew
(24/7
at her beck and call)
down from
Olympus
quicksilver service of
his divine mistress
she needing
a word, more
than a word with her
misfiring genius
also
express delivery a vial
not of regular old absinthe but
crystal-precious ambrosia
not just
once but twice, thrice
carbon filtered and
scientifically
distilled
his eyes still smarting in recoil
from her last light show
before she decided
to conclude mutual proceedings
in standard mortal
Helen of Troy form
whatever and
whichever way to
be diced
she
not to be taken lightly
jazz of her in full worship glory
too much for
me to bear
MOON
only a spring recoil away
from evil in motion
truly malign action
genocidal event
for which
technology off
on a whim serving as the
great multiplier
distance from the blood
that sticky sweet to
the touch
never gets washed off
but what
the eye does not see
the heart can Enola Gay over
stay fuzzy, misdirected
as from over the hill
over the horizon
they send the first strike
that removes all the worry
of retaliation
and there it is
engine of war, motor
of history
carting us off over
a shameful moon
LONG NIGHT
let me walk you through
the length of a night
the breadth of a poem
sorry if you so surely Shelley
about the nature of rhyme
miss a beat, grimace
flutter as the lines stutter
not Homer blind but
pretty much a
stick-shuffling cripple
trying to make it through
short days
long nights
when you so cookie-cutter
about everything
dial in delivery
everything on the menu
from hot to
G spot
long night love afterglow
basking in luxury
let me
cuddle my pen
dishing you
this trash
SUCH THINGS
supply
demand
greed
shackles and
sheckels
we got a whole
market economy
but what
the downside, what
the tightening tariff
tell me now
for I was born of woman
am part of that insanity
but now
for my sins
though still wedged in
am edging my way out
tunnelling
towards the light
I never truly
believed in
scarcely a scrap of paper
to my name
to record
what I feel here
instinctively, by Nature
(Reason to
catch up later).
words begging
for attention
kiss my ass to that bliss
which I
never earned anyway
you tell them you tell them
what we started with
such hope
dead from imagination
NOT TOO FAR-FETCHED TO BELIEVE
no not
quite the perfect
device for
reaching consensus
producing acceptance
no fault of
the poet, one
the poem must own;
reflect only
the art that failed
to inspire left
much to
communicate
the poet so much
rejection heading his
her way during
the course
of which lifetime
poem
the only compensation
and yet here
it fails
(not too far-
fetched to believe) No
SCRATCH
that’s rich!
a hint
of measured, justice apocalypse
is the thing you missed
blues mingling with reds
contending
with purples
strikingly: so much so
that you miss the fine writing
on the wall now
spreading across
the sky
all at sea, the logos screwed,
politically, economically, socio-
logically
counting on the prescience of
index, rolladex,
all your database systems
as the waves roll in tides change
continents tilt currents shift
bringing you fully up
to speed
fully up to scratch
poems 2 die for