Tag Archives: universe

COMPOSITION

COMPOSITION

pass me your pen
and I shall note down
those distances

the chalk on the blackboard
having list its imperative

the writing
on the wall changing
the moment it
gets written

the truth of relativity
not yet board-dustered off
yet already
done and dusted

and how many tiny white
flecks
   look like motion-
captured stars, galaxies
in their movement?

at if
squeezing
the truth out of us,
pinching our analogies

the Universe were
writing us
writing the Universe itself

putting us
into, pulling us
out oh the picture

trying to figure out
which composition
works best

which
makes the
most sense

POET IN THE RAIN

POET IN THE RAIN

the rain sizzles
poet splitters
a few syllables
dissolves, melts

flows somewhere
as liquids are wont to

meanwhile
(for a billion meanwhiles)
the cosmos carries on
business
      as usual

same old laws
that birthed us, did
us in
   upon which we
came to depend

unless
     things changed, shifted gear,
found a different trajectory
whole new
direction

could
     have fooled us

no one around to document, observe
no one left to tell

PLASMA (POEM FOR CARLOS SANTANA)

PLASMA (POEM FOR CARLOS SANTANA)

say it was gradual
no big bang but
some
   kind of inflation

whereupon in this
fable
     gas clouds gravity
stars
      plasma

hydrogen helium
smorgasbord of elements

and you
      subject of
every song

Muse of
   every meditation

you every delicious atom
of your loveliness
from
   an entirely different star

Oh baby
    reminding me tonight
of that crucible
perfect furnace

and then
        soul, word,
music

constellation
        gnosis between galaxy
upon galaxy

ocean upon ocean

you wrestling with that
red python
    on the Woodstock stage

(if you don’t mind me saying so)
cosmos coursing through you
         

FLIRTIN’

FLIRTIN’

the Universe
was flirting with me

at the quantum level
basement, mezzanine,
and other
levels

and thinking myself
star child suddenly
I flirted too

Universe
longer in the tooth
than me
     must have got
the wrong messages
probably
   reading a poem
where as
per usual

was
denying my age

but what could I do
but be
unfaithful to my reality
by playing along

for the Universes
was fine, looking
really good this evening
unlike during
the day
   when of the cosmos
no one sees nothing, sunlight
blanching everything
into one
   bright blue sky dark
gray sky, everyday
                 stereotype

yes
  Universe was flirting
endeavouring
maintain
     a solid connection
pique my degree
of interest

establish the terms of
our reciprocity

without which neither gets
to think existence
    

OXIDE

OXIDE

angles
are collisions

bespeak incidence
and refraction

can see this
check.it out
from the running time
of the Universe
and

all those iron-oxide
socialist red planets

elephant
in the room

no room
for the elephant

enough
room
   in the elephant

space
to cover every surreal
contingency
short of nightmare

space to burble, jumble up
words bounce balls
and spheres and
jagged
     pieces of
interstellar debris

around and
around and around


ENHANCE

ENHANCE

not enough
outrageously wonderful
stars up there

need some more
to stop it failing
as a spectacle

paint me, etch me
an additional few up there to
give everybody
in the galaxy
something to think about

we’ll keep it a secret between us
exactly what we did

no one else having the faintest idea
     where this brand new
Rigel, Vega, Betelgeuse
and Sirius came from

the more
     the merrier they
will probably say

not the great cosmologists though, their knickers
surely now
    going to get
             into a twist

knocking their careful relativity
space-time curvature calculations
uncomfortably cocked-
hat sideways

not their thing really
to find their all-
conquering physics suffering
a degree of
     unnecessary embarrassment
in the cause
of our natural human
creative desire
    for the ability to
transform and artistically enhance