Tag Archives: poetry

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.

TRACK

TRACK

am always asked
“am I
on the right track?”

you are asking this

of one

whose recurrent
anxiety dream is
being without
a ticket
    on the wrong train

didn’t realize that this
was a message about
your dream
       as much as it was
about my
inhibiting anxieties

when it comes to this business
clear from the start
                      catch
the wrong train
relax go
         with the ride

flow is the direction
the only
          direction

and when
       the train
         shuffles into the station
at this
    strange destination

place where
           you need to be
and can

rip
  up the track

ASSURED

ASSURED

if it walks like a duck
quacks like a duck
must be a duck
unless
     you refuse to believe
no way
it can’t be

but what if
the duck
is in a tank
firing shells
at hospital, a shelter,
a university?

what if the duck
is scoping you
and your family
working out
how the whole little
delectable loving
band of you

can be
his perfect shot?

what
    about you though

no sense of duck, no
no sense of
goose
     no sense of gander

no sense of where
duck becomes
a turkey
       shoot
and, by definition perhaps,
equally
   vice-
         versa

or
where to
run to (if there
is anywhere)

who to
speak to
(everybody
   ducking the question)

ducking the question
but not a hope
in Hell
    of ducking

the fat
rocket

the big, big
2000 lb bomb

you standing there
in holy innocence
proclaiming
       (not above the sound
of heavy
ordinance whistling)

it cannot be genocide
for

humanity
   would be here to save me
if indeed it were

humanity
      will save me

I am
    assured

ABOUT GAZA

ABOUT GAZA

I wanted to
talk to you
about Gaza

because there
is so much confusion
about where you stand

you fill my head
with all these poems
so much
    poetry

no use to anybody
poems that all those
who proclaim themselves
your most beloved

would say, do not
bear analysis, are
not worth the reading
are the product
of your antithesis
are openly blaspheming

and they are right
of course they are right

no point in my
attacking them, sanitizing them
throwing the proverbial
poetic kitchen sink
at them

in the name of the children
their shells
and bombs
    are maiming, killing

IN BED

IN BED

in bed
thinking of fairy tales

bed being
best place for
any kind of fairy
tale

inclusive of
child, adult and
seriously classified ones
the ones that
reveal
   the wicked witch is
not dead (reports of
her demise
strategically exaggerated) and Empire is
          forever always naked
just  trick of
the light
        and indoctrination that
goes by the name
of education

that we see
     what we believe:
Empire and Emperor
(its pure
    embodiment) is always
richly attired
  and powerfully adorned

no fear that this change
because fairy tale is the
dream of
all that abides
       supremely happy ever after

above history
beyond change

OVERLOOKED

OVERLOOKED

I awake
fresh from nightmare

lost my way in a city
of memory spiralling upwards
into the mountains
totally transformed beyomd
all that I
can remember
wanting
    to get home
needing to get home

but no sense of direction
as with every step
I climb higher
and higher
passing a giant cathedral
like structure, itself
like a mountain with
a trio of spires as
its peaks, its pinnacles

all the wonder
    I should feel submerged
by the fear

and no way of phoning you
because I am
out of reception, do
not have
your number
so far for you
to drive
      in the night to
collect me

your death three years ealier
somehow dream- forgotten
crucially overlooked
    

RUBBLE

RUBBLE

books were
my civilization
               not enough
have
they taughr me

but where are
the books to
be seen
to be found

in these cities of
sky high

demented aspiration
built upon
       rubble

and
     when one
of those towers somehow
happens to
fall

   teach me where to
find smooth smooth stones

midst all
       that dust and rubble