BROOM CUPBOARD

BROOM CUPBOARD

broom cupboard
you have the rigour
and acumen
of a broom cupboard
and not one
that anyone in
their right mind
would consider
spacious

no, this cupboard
is so tiny
best it could do
would be to hold
a brush or two,
though admittedly
more could be hosted
if the broom and brushes
were in fact broken,
which, in your case,
they naturally are

and so we must come
to your intervention
a strange mixture I felt
between the necessarily glib
and striving
to be profound

if it were served as sustenance
it seemed neither solid
nor in any way, by
size or shape, nothing
that had not been pre-,
paid or especially selected
to give the support
the ranks of the mindless
seem to save
for their own

no fat suet dumpling floating
in hot greasy water
is the best
cuisine analogy I can
dredge up for you

watching that fat imperial face
dole out imperial ideology
as if history
had stripped your
divided nation

down to a plane, perhaps
a tank
and a boat or two

not the right backup stuff
for tough talk premised
on old battleship diplomacy

pop
goes the pop gun

in any
real confrontation with
the rising world
they sweep clean
your talk is doomed

RETURN

RETURN

sat by the oasis
dreaming of the ocean
dreaming of rivers.

sonetimes
water is everything
whole story
story beyond story

not your cockeyed
fable, an affront
to intelligence, all
our sensibilities

trying to tell me
it was delivered unto you
directly from Heaven
that angels had in a hand
in all the suffering
this has caused

so badly told, open
to simple deconstruction

the power that
truth must speak to

the lie
     so ingrained, expression
of that darkneds to which
front
beginning of time
we have
always aspired

but as for me
waiting at this oasis
for whatever inspiration

know how in this
business, words
                       beginning
to swim

line by
line
moment by moment

thinking, writing the river
the ocean

suddenly all talk
is of this great return

FANCY

FANCY

we have (all of us)
our very own fancy
for apocalypse

projecting on the world
our own thirst and fear
of ending (Oh what a strange
species we
are indeed!)

yes, what thrill is the final
scene
     if you perform it alone
stage empty, auditorium deserted,

is there not supposed to
be resonance, sweet slash
bittersweet connection

and then there are
those most philosophical
of warriors, most warlike
of philosophers

there music too, will shake
you like no other
between such highs and lows

to which, if that we not enough,
we must add the crime
of psychoanalysis

one in particular
Leo-sign showman

reading from a single patient
the brutal future history of
nation
       and a species
it did decide it had done with

no schadenfreude here
     just special kind of
go

when the revelation that
we are not gods
we aspire to be
gets us plunging into
final destruction

tumbling
of power
         from its throne

and power with its exit clause,
its played-through endgames

knows
      (knows all too well
all too well)

always space for
last laugh

           throw of those
diabolically secret dice

at the death         at the death

yes, that gotterdammerung word
nutshells that best

FRIEDRICH

FRIEDRICH

I was getting nowhere
praying for my soul

falling by the wayside
moving further away

which exact
moment you seized
to muscle in
on me
hold a knife
to my throat
(sharpest possible
blade I do
now believe)
and, lightning lurking
in those eyes,
gave me
      books of
our darkest, sweetest god
to negotiate

mugging me
      in the Church

so
about to fall

situation pretty much
the same
      as when
      the dark god
mugged you.

COUNT

COUNT

count
every atom

every drop
of blood

every grain of sand

count every blade of grass
how they blow
in the wind like
a feast of sabres
a forest
       of tiny spears

read
   these words
the desert itself
wrote for you
          (what an ear
the people of
the desert
       have for
the voice
     of God

absolute pitch
when it comes
to the poetry of the soul

read what is written
    read what
has been hidden

read the Sun, the stars
the Moon
       waxing waning
now
a perfect crescent

read
   and count

find a rhythm, your rhythm
calculate all distances
devise
     the algorithms
for perfect measure

ditto
and Amen

ditto and Amen

this tale continues
despite our failings, despite
                  our hatreds
out tragic divisions

the words of  the Sufis
written in the stars

connecting every blade
of grass
    drop of blood
grain of sand

ditto and Amen

every atom
count, read, measure

BOMBED

BOMBED

we tried to shout out
to the angels
but somehow our calls
failed to get through

we spoke to the mobile service providers
but they were too
caught up in billing problems
and arrangements

defaulting customers who
despite issues of legality
they need to hunt down

make
an example of, wreak
revenge upon

meanwhile the angels
hear nothing but

sounds of children
getting bombed

so much for them
to ponder
without our political
and intellectual
explanations
wondering
what the Hell exactly
is going on

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

BARBARUS


BARBARUS

I watched the debate
(if you could call it that)

moderated
(if you call it that)

by program host
Piers Morgan

watched in awe
the cool demeanour
of Professor Finkelstein

wish I were
that impervious to
ad hominem attacks

could behave like Norman
not Conan the Barbarian.