
GRANNY PRINT










WAYSIDE
the worst ones
that fell by the wayside
had to be poets
what other conclusion
can we come to?
what wealth do they bring
unto themselves
and unto all of humanity
with words and lines
well beyond the general reach?
I think about
why this
should be so, plainly
it seems to resist explanation
this compulsion to
act otherwise, play
in a different key
sing
a different song
so far beyond my comprehension
I have to reach for
the oddest of all metaphors
to get my head around it
AND TO LOVE
danced all night you did
first meeting and me
not yet
on the agenda
I suppose I must feel glad
you contrived to shut
every other option out
don’t know what it would feel
like right now
never to have been conceived
never have to come
into existence
never to have encountered
the day the dancing stopped
ground to a halt
eventually dead in
its tracks
and me and my siblings
left wondering
if this is what time
and children do
to passion, and to love
OUTSIDE
living
in metaphor
living
outside of time
do angels
like tachyons
dance
backwards
have they seen
your future before
you were born?
can you pack more of
them on the point of
push infinitely more
of them
through the eye
of a needle
than an equivalent
mass of
Higgs bosun particles?
and all the bad that you
spill or contrive to
in your
little life narrative
do they dissect
to last recurring decimal place
or simply erase?
EMILY
those serial killer eyes
that butcher’s smock
dead give aways
told you are a poet
I would have put
good money on
you writing
thus exactly
your writing desk an
abbatoir
where you carve and cure
your fillet steak
cut thick or
thin, made
to exact measure
horrible and gorgeous
how when I read
a line
I can taste
the bloodwould you like your
poetry rare, Sir, or au
tartare
the potatoes, greens,
well these we can give you
done well done
all the way from
crunchy crisp
to
rock hard
sweeter than sweet when
you sing
the soul’s dark song though
solitary in the darkness, none
so intrepid as
to join, let
alone sing along