the face indistinct composite says nothing but bluffs, a closed bud a violet the garden hung w starlight no-one sees, the trees undercut, shades between, the plane that glides the voided sky at Pisces. call it digression, a slip in standards. my dna is 99% gorilla 2% banana, but we’re not similar. the death of…
Ambition and Imagery
I will heave into the hands of hope, spitting from blood-thick mouthfuls – brimming with the ecstasy of once again having bitten off much more than I can chew. I will dislocate into each appetite, thriving headlong towards the outrageous fuchsia of some explicit garden, doomed to grow like a snake eating an antelope. I…
This Little Bay
Crab-legs of rock guard this little bay. It is a half-smile where seabirds ride the inshore swell. It is home to stork and squawking gull, and on the rocky shore oyster catchers’ red daggers prise out creatures that squirm in the sand. The basalt here is caked, split by sun and wave. When it is…
Looking Back West
East west winds. North south rows. Autumn’s chill fingers rubbing vineyards the wrong way. The brown corduroy suit my mother had made for me My brother’s in aqua the colour of my faded Air NZ satchel and Dad’s MkII Cortina two tone with a carless day sticker. M*A*S*H, Happy Days or Taxi at…
Childhood
“Look mummy! There’s a shape-changer on the roof! First it was a man, and now it is a cougar!” “-Don’t be silly, boy, shape-changers don’t climb onto rooves.” “Yes yes! I saw it! He’s there.” The sun beat down on the mother and son, Their little tea party on the deck continued. Howard finished…
Island
I land where I am – ripcord born, pacific-eyed and wheeling mad as gannets in smiling gyre, prowling for the cold line of horizon beyond its great gullet of blue. I rouse downward to the terraforming grin of isles bellied by cloud. There must be some kind of foot to pledge to, some thigh-bone in…
white dog on water is buoyant, lifeless
tortoise lit sprayed w gas walks away maimed mid-mass heads roll flock puffed clods beneath cross stench & the bodies. are these memories/ flat the road up sun-struck dark & dust dries our skin the mind winds measured disinterested but. who was it sunk so desolate? so low alone the m- 6 bowels stirred by…
Time knows
I wrote a poem once airing and burying secrets and shame. A poet engaged with me about his job in waste management. He had some good points. I wrote a poem once about a tragedy and loss of life. Later the death toll went up and my poem got better. Not because of the…
Stairway to Nowhere
I live in a house – with a stairway to nowhere – But I have my heaven – When I’m in your arms – Dusky moonlight floods her light – As we lay & hold each other tight I live in a house – with a stairway to nowhere – But I have my heaven…
A Day To Day Forgetting
(the 90’s in bedsits & share-houses) they stayed, if they could, impassive, immediate, lowered themselves, sat-squat on the word’s hearth, drip sat on its flame-lick, wet fire, tank straddled, finger-loosened bungs; unlocked at the front, they’d come back unsure of this at first, and the second time, with American verse, the confessional females, I’d perform…
blood
say nothing. the sheets are damp. the doorknob turns. it’s going to hurt. it hurts but keep going. flushed w heat w shame of it. failure to communicate. the heart beats in its chest. it isn’t a trick, omg it’s so easy. you can do it in yr sleep. you can do it when yr…
from SANDY ROOMS #4
6 morning like nothing had happened; bench about a foot wide, three railings and seven or more municipal coats of various enamel paints covering seventy years of dawns, hissing ocean, salt and soap, sand, ‘sects, the bus so it links with the first train for one person who may feel the whole city conspires with,…