GODS

GODS

great
we got our journalists
picking his pockets
tapping his phone

if we
get enough dirt
on him
    can use our pages
to persuade him
not to
   talk about kingship
stay away
from such plays

and that one
who would phosophize us
away
    from our set and staid
and hegemonic ways

would
    think us
inside out and
      upside down

we got the video, had
it photoshopped, PR
refined smudge
            and smear aligned

shows her at her worst she
could ever be (though
neither so
    bad as you, or I) but
good
   enough to bring
her down

any one who thinks (gender
aside) is
         a worse-than-perverse-clown)

why
    do they think themselves
above all who
think what
they are
         told

why else this business? Why else
the rollers
        roll

serving you your world up
on a plate, we tell it as
freedom but
   we all know
            its fate

you
are
   what you are
and what
             we designate

so
   test us out
            why don’t you?
just give it
a try

nothing we cannot belittle
nothing we cannot dare not
cut down to
    basic size
who would have thought
crudity and super-
ficiality supreme
human virtues
who could ever have imagined
we couls write an all
new ten commandments
use all our
   new-found political
pressure to
sell them
     in the market before
entrusting them to God

you cannot challenge it
we are
       perfectly set
in our mindset

lie
is truth

and
slimy and obese-
brained though we
may well be

beneath this tawdry
bleary mortal flesh

we are gods
we are gods

     test our powers
     you will come to believe

TANTAMOUNT

TANTAMOUNT

I stumble
into the temple
past
the guards
and moneylenders
who appear
not to notice

my, how fruitful and prosperous
— a billion, trillion times fold

since
the time of Jesus

and there
in the inner sanctum
I behold a trinity
Pennywise, Baron
Harkonnen
and the hydra-
headed great
of Merkava

brooding on something
hatching their joint scheme

lucky, in fact,
our blessed fortune,
that all this
amounts to
all this
be tantamount to
is a
meaningless dream.

KANSAS GEORGE AND THE FLYING MONKEY

KANSAS GEORGE AND
THE FLYING MONKEY

Hello George
I am
also
   George

funny about that
isn’t it
    George

people might call it
a coincidence
but there
   are no
coincidences

where are
          we George?

are you the blue fairy?
are we
    both red fairies?
are we
   the munchkins
are we
     in Kansas, in Oz
somewhere in the 60s
down
     in Hait-Ashbury

carefree
    and happy
enjoying
a summer of love

now
   don’t go
wicked witch on me George
fall on that
ball all
serious

go total
flying monkey

jumping on that ball
as if it is not
all
   just a game.

WON

WON

we came for the big game

met on the intersection
of Meridian and
          Equator

we sat for the battle

you
waited in awe

they remained standard
first,
      before a piece touched

they insisted on rule changes
make the game more equitable
in other words
      their game more powerful

bishops
       and knights

should be made invulnerable
echoing their
feudal
      reputation
(“especially the white squared one”:
someone chirping
       from the corner)

and then
       it had to go, whole en passant rule
as unnecessary compromising
defences

and when
     Kings castle on the back rank

strength of rook
alongside be
                  doubled from
five to
      ten

to echo their supreme
nuclear strength

we came for the game
                 whole world watching

what
    a shock it was
           the day we won

ENTIRE

ENTIRE

you have clocked us
and cluedoed us
and played
every
   game
with us

to see the world
through photoshopped eyes

to switch on that strobe light
good for interrogations

but not for
viewing from a divine perspective

all you have dehumanized
stripped of humanity
millions of God’s image

murdered
each, as your great book says,
a Universe entire

AND VANITY PRESS

AND VANITY PRESS

I am
all about death

and vanity
press

this i
(readily) confess
to
     both

    woman
and
       God

the chimes
in my head
            both essence
of poetry
but also
   cash register

and so I write
of holocaust and genocide
things that
        lately delight

if not
    why so tiny effort, huge
reluctance

to stop
    doing so?

the sound effects of
slaughter

    so much
one can do with them

GIMME

GIMME

world’s
falling apart

little children
getting blown
to
   smithereens

so gimme that
sweet false consciousness
that would come
with a
    SuperBowl victory

don’t let Mahomes
spoil everything
with
    an insane overtime
charge

this after Kyle left
his best laid plans
in a briefcase
in the
    locker room

this is not
   the script I want,
I need

so write me a new one
bring me that
thick syrupy delusion
that a Niners’
Vegas victory
          would bring

the world falling apart
                         bits
of little
children

how come I always get
             caught this way

how come
I’m not
         so smart
                   

LINE

LINE

you drew a line

said this is
the law, the rule,
the commandment,
the ordinance,
the regulation

suddenly
      no sooner had
you signed off
than the line curved
bent multiplied
wriggled all
over
    the page
my page

not yours;
on your still a single line
plain as day

cutting across the page
East to West
right to
         left

dividing everything
North South
               into two
unequal
hemispheres

you drew a line
for all time