poetry – Page 21 – poems 2 die for

COMPLEXITY

aeons of complexity
billions of
years of
evolution

what was once
unicellular microscopic
creature
waking up
at the opposite
end of
time

not a thought
in its head
no idea where
to take this poem

MISUNDERSTANDING

Yes, we did
have our intimate moment

but now
in the afterglow

we seem
to be labouring
under a
misunderstanding

talking to each other
as if every word
macine transcribed
into Enigma code

acting under
the erroneous assumption
that we
are somehow created
as divine reflection

and not
some extension of plankton
whose million
year evolution took
a pretty
ludicrous turn.

FRIDGE SYLLOGISM

my cats, great philosophers
that they are
assure me
that inside my
old fridge

it is
pure utopia

a Platonic communist state
jam packed with delicacies
for all
felines
to share

each according to their need, and
power to irrutate

and I, for my Sins (all of
which pretty mortal), have
five of
them, one Socratic,
another Nietzschean and the
rest undecided whether
to follow Slavoj
Zizek or
call themselves Arisotelian

masters (and mistresses) of
the art of the syllogism
each of these
little logicians
expert at reasoning

and so would you be too
if you believed for a moment,
as cats indeed do,
that we
are blessed with
a modicum of rationality
if not an entirely rational species

whose yes/no, valid/invalid, true/false binary processes
can be read off their faces

and exploited to
ensure the

keys to
that aforementioned
paradise are not
left entirely in human hands

AND FIRE

Suddenly the sky faded, went
watercolours

turned blueberry ripple
as
at that end of the spectrum
they flowed into each other
all those short
wavelength colours
in all their pastel shades

or maybe not suddenly, maybe
I might have been
distracted and missed
the entire
sequence

the transformation as
it progressed step
by tiny step

and so
mystified by the allure
of all these blue -mauves
I let my fancy,
for a moment,
run away with me

taking
a serious bet with
higher powers

that Angels on bicycles
would shortly appear

miraculously pedalling
through the lilac clouds

not to
be likened to, or mistaken for
military drones

loaded to capacity
with all that they need
to turn
everything moving
to smoke and fire

MOVES

rotten at
chess puzzles

hopeless
at Rubik’s Cube

have such trouble
with all your
straps and fasteners

near clear skies
and an ocean
that is
a millpond

to set sail
and make my
killer move

SORRY FOR

Sorry for pulling you
out of the world of your smartphone
if only for a moment
to scroll
through these lines here

reading this thing
history will decide
is not
even a poem

presuming that
there will be history
and that world
outside your phone
but now
contained immediately
inside it

goes full Dr Stangelove
full we’ll meet again
total exchange nuclear

messing with
the service courtesy
end of the atmosphere.

LET ME

let me
make you
my masterpiece

a love portrait
to bring out
the ecstatic
best in you

painting
to the limit of my artistry
pushing
the envelope
of my craft

using this simple, humble,
custom-designed brush

LONELY PARK

am here
I am not here

my five cats
assuming I am here

which is
existentially reassuring

sunset on its way
three of the five felines —
Twinkle, Sasha, Panda Buddy —
scouting around me

powerful it is
this shared animal connection
assumption of presence

drums threading their way
through the village
seem to need
to find me

thumping bass
possibly from
the same location, same direction

hard to
get a
fix, judge
the distance

there is
always distance

am here
am not here

fit in
I do not fit in

am loved
I am unloved
am sort of loved perhaps
almost entirely

just sitting here, settled
my little room
getting cleaned
behind me

minding my own business
that business being
scribbling ideas
for the final scene
in “Demolition”
the novel I am writing

the world
turning

observing me minding away
curious about
the nature of
this final scene I do
believe
will clinch everything

scene in which I sit
pretty much as I am doing
right now

watching the world — if
not my world —
fall to pieces

BOUNDLESS

I am boundless
big boss predator
at the summit
of the food chain

extravagantly remunerated
on account of
my hunting skills

as if…
but if I were

the immense wealth
I possessed
how I would
deploy it politically
throw it around

get you to
cheer, and now, and
beg and scrape
and recite
praise poetry before me

no other sound

RED SHIFT

I am
getting
red-shifted

stretched out
and with this insane
elasticity

the laws of physics
laws of human society
changing
as space time itself changes

as idiots
get stretched out, magnified,
find themselves
in positions of power

owing everything
to entropy, to the twenty
first century
media miracle
of slavish stability

sitting dumbfounded as
it all goes to
shit around them
yet not
quite dumb enough
to go down
with the ship

easy exoneration
one of the true, necessary
blessings of absolute power

this red
shifting me beyond
the old
degrees of
acceptance this
practice requires