poem – Page 56 – poems 2 die for

BANJO

ITSELF

ACROSS THE BOARD

what royal devil here
in the meticulous detail?

from a to h and
one to eight

get your computation
one square wrong and
what you
calculated plain
sailing takes you
through
the logic of
a Scylla and Charibdis

on your hero’s
doomed journey across
this unforgiving board

every distinction absolute
here, across the board

AND THIS

and this is the wine-
dark sea the poet imagined

never saw
except as the thousand
ship keels ploughed their
way through
its waves

to save Helen
from disaster in the arms
of Paris and that
wily Odysseus might
outwit the cyclops

time and time again
manouvre his way
past god
and demon

on his way
back to
Ithaca

resting place
of all story
I am told

SNAKE YEAR

so many crackers
set to explode at
midnight new year

such a big ban
here to welcome the snake
thrill one
and all

such an explosive bang
beyond anything before

promises
to do justice
to the last year of all

HELVETICA

poem writes
itself

poem
writes me

writes me
cursive

writes me
in helvetica

writes me run on
writes me
end-
stop

writes me
as I cannot
write myself

quoting Barthes
so
pardon
my French

comme or
sans
serif

in strict
disciinarian font

or comic topography
to show
everything of
gravitas

is
ultimately ironical

C & C LTD.

playing chess
making love

knights
forking everything
on on the board

I think Cheech and Chong
as in my grandmaster stupor

Chong
and Cheech

to know where I am endgaming
right now
need more
smoke and mirrors

don’t want to Robin Williams genie myself
into a series of explosive
moves
rebounding in
my face

need some of your C & C good stuff to
take
the edge off
my embarrassment

need to conserve, focus
direct
until in sight,
within
touch I do get
to light the fuse

Oh
let the joke not be too
much on me my darlings

cold fusion
supreme complement
contribution

ultimate solution
to needs and desires, desires
and needs

GOODNIGHT MOVES

a game
of structure

and sequence, could
not be more linear

but everymove
of yours
ends up
in checkmate

those knights
working hand in glove
with their
Queen;
Lancelot-Guinevere
complicity in everything

L there
not for
“love”
certainly not
for “learner”

and me
with the foresight
of a pawn
watching front,
back and centre
overlooking
the diagonals

outflanked, double
enveloped
shanked
in the rear

your game a brutal
thing of beauty

seemingly all
of the cuff but
some inner mathematics
lies at
the heart of
such execution tapidly realised
planning (you
could figure
it out
naked
could play it blindfold)

and me
back in my box
my crypt of a crib

such great
goodnight that’s all
see you
in another life moves

hit
queenside, kingside, by
file, by rank

mastermind mistress
at the heart
of everything
pulling all the strings

dominating ftom
the centre (and
oh
what
a centre!)

every opening in
the book
sheer innuendo!

what
ecstasy to
one day
win

when every
loss such a pleasure.

BILLBOARD

what if I told you
the cosmos is just
a billboard?

a two dimensional image
projected into full 3D
to advertise
some forthcoming
attraction

and maybe (not
promising anything)
this a picture
in which

your atoms
could well feature

not in
the form

you find
them now

not as happy a fit,
or much, much better

BY GEORGE

“advertising changes perception”
George Lois

pan upwards
further upwards dummy

yep
up there to that third
spiral galaxy
there’s George Lois
selling Tommy
Hillfiger to
some advanced alien
civilization
too gray and dour
to speak
of

or so they were
until George discovered them
made them
the coolest, chicest
most presentable creatures
in their
or any galaxy
for that matter

except
our own