I I’m sick with emptiness; excess; an ambivalence I can’t express, ever; one day some fine/blade may sever that vein/for me to tell, until then listen well if you will. II Some…nameless one remains: an inner eye; living corpse, half- hid in the undergrowth; enemy within, who knows what I think, I thought was…
(from) detachments – 1 & 2
Cut Bless my suffering cut short, shorn like lawn on long summer days. Tedious heaven. These hours of suffering are swathed by an eternity of days: was, will be. Bliss. There’s no death but how to tell it? Last night was all one to me – Whitman…
Road Trip
On days such as this the road is a black mirror, rolling out hard and long into the distance, ridges bars of bouncing light, the tyres hot, thrumming on coarse chip and the birds weaving in the high thin air against the sky; the hot air a brush on your face and teasing your thoughts…
At The Beach
Sagging kapok beds, sea’s wash and moan, sun yellowing papers, streaming over our lives, wishing for nothing more, no will to move; anglers in works gumboots, white and stolen crossing a shingled shore to whip high rods at sun. We watched lazily, the lazy, as kahawai died bled in the sun. Something to do. On a…
Tea and Poems
A high ceiling in spring, white with a filigree border and genteel conversation floats over earl grey and the waitress’s apron rises and falls with her light step; tea and cakes, spilling cream, a man with a silly hat and ill-fitting hand-knit jersey trying to impress his mother – or his maiden aunt. The traffic…
first meeting
first meeting* based on Reiner Stach’s description of Franz Kafka’s first meeting with Felice Bauer (see page 100, ‘Kafka The Decisive Year’s by Reiner Stach, translated by Shelley Frisch) only a few words yet enough to put you out to sea silly boy you liked her to the ‘point of sighing’ you spilled out to…
white cross on sea
white cross on sea* για ο,τι μου δόθηκε απο την καρδιά αυτού του λαού, απο τον ήλιο τους, άσπρη καρδιά της θάλασσας for what was given to me by the heart of this people, by their sun, white heart of the sea they had it hard as any land’s lot ever was forced to…
the girl on the swing
The girl skipped off the swing and walked away. That swing is moving still; caught, I thought at first, by a slow wind. But its twin, the swing next to it, is dead still. I think that I’m lost in the sky, the leavings of a butterfly; eyes upon the ghost…
The Road West
The road here slants west, carving to the hill, past the tender tumble down homes, past the crouching thatched cottage in its frozen secret place; beyond the flinty corner whose face bends the wind. It is a place of endless shadow, prickled frost. Time has put an edge on this land – hardened it and…
Ode
Was the manuscript going to be a hoax or a codex cipher He was appointed to the imperial distillery Then placed to take charge of the botanical gardens and be a personal physician Linguistic patterns of language Contextual arrangements of notes and words The words broken down into letter by letter character cipher Awkward to…
Sweet Music
Quite florescent mist lingers after the rain our mounts are quaking about the wind The breeze when it blows is full of the salt of tears They sense the incoming storm Tenderfoot I feed them carrots pat them calm Sweet music wills me towards you Your stare transparent in my eyes Me an urchin in…
when I think
when i think in the style of an old lament when i think of the friends the few i have that touch a distant part of me where the mystery of self a flicker amongst flickers in a vastness is rolled back a little like a walk out along a low-tide shore when i…