Tag Archives: poetry

FIRST REFUSAL

FIRST REFUSAL

Derrida
is in the forest

so beware lovers, children

be
excited

every plant has chenistry
there are carnivorous creatures
things shaped
to mirror your desire

anarchy
in the air
confusion in
the clouds

      slip, slide
shifting
   the twilight lingering

and whilst this
state of being persists
continues to pull us, call
                         us

who are we sad everyday
little mortals to refuse.

CHOSEN

CHOSEN

Athena most
strongly advised me
to keep
an eye out
fot the Cyclops

that mutanr breed,
twisted spawn
of the sea

Poseidon’s flesh munching
off-sprimg
   
i owe so much to
this dsughter of Zeus

who so elevated my wisdom,
my knowledge
payback for my selecting her
above Hera, above Aphrodite

the last of whom
has left me
denuded
      of love

my lonely, empty
nights doubly insured

DUCKY

DUCKY

I remember my
first cricket encounter

how the red gleam of
that battering ball

instantly
took the shine
out of me, rubbed
off
    my high-
spirited gloss

what a
     way for sweet naivete
to die

trudging out in huge pads
like a robot on an odd planet

reaching the wicket
taking my guard

      one ball at a time
       one ball at a time

only got one
or perhaps none
             so fast it was

the monster that hurled it
that brutal savage
of a
    best friend

what hope did I have
in this game of gentlemen
of imperial measure

his father
     knowing the game
taught him everything

was that
   a smirk on my father’s face

when i tearfully explained
to my Mother
   the abject ignominy
of going out for a duck

CONSPIRACY

CONSPIRACY

What is it
with AI and cats

did cats do the programming
did TS Eliot,
modernist superpoet
calculate the bits abd bytes
in binary vers libre?

perhaps
     cats did it themselves

something in them,
a backdoor code, a virus
that gets machine intelligence
to gush,
turn to goo

whenever that three-letter
plosive-heavy word is
whispered or mentioned

myself
I hate TS Eliot and abhor
those creatures
despite the artistry they show
in pretending
they love you
infinitely more convincing
that what any stupid
human being
might plausibly attempt

if there is a great Matrix
conspiracy you
have to know cats
lie behind it

a computer simulated
world without dogs
where we are the
batteries
to provide the electricity
to warm their little litter trays

IF I WERE TO DISAPPEAR

IF I WERE TO DISAPPEAR

if I were to disappear
on the night of the performance
don’t tell anyone, say
nothing
    a big quiet nothing
like Hamlet might say stretching
the bounds of
our understanding, sheer
human appreciation
though so soft
      no one on stage with him
in that room of Elsinore,
can (we must
believe) hear a single word
he has been scrtpted to say

No, my dear Thato, just
blow a kiss, all three
of you
    blow a kiss
and walk away

knowing I glided through
that fourth wall
like it
   was made of silk, cobweb fine
or most diaphanous

and now
I am with King Harry
asking to lead the voward
and so
   will get butchered by the French in the
course of the battle

if you have to get butchered
who better than the French
to do it with style
with every cut
every thrust
   reciting every great poet
of theirs from Ronsard
to Rimbaud
and me
      held in suspense
awaiting the beauty of
their perfect coup-de-gras

or
   there you are my Queen
peeling grapes, chewing dates
awaiting your Apollo
your
     Roman lion, your Anthony

and we too wedded to ourselves
to smell the ships leaving port
sailing south fat
with legionaries

our deaths
the first act of Empire, suddenly
out of nowhere this
worst of all
glorious phases
in the history
of oppressed humanity

but then
as Puck himself
I return to the stage
at the waking
moment of your Midsummer
dream

craving understanding,
friendship
   and forgiveness

see the lights go on
and you
     my dear three
and all
around you
       simply disappear