The deadness of this thought is so obvious to me now.
Even if you reportedly died trying to call me,
I wouldn’t believe it, and it wouldn’t become me. The only
problem now is what to do with these poems littering the riverside,
all this energy spent, all this good rubber on wheels,
all this snow I arranged for you, all these thought processes.
Thank you again. I am confident that
there will be no further disturbing of my brain.
Sunday, 18 May 2008
Saturday, 17 May 2008
Repeat Death
Death brushes by me again,
in the shape of a wounded wing
attached to this woman thing.
Small, insignificant and difficult,
taking all my time and my eyes,
this repeat death is slow and nearly
unnoticeable. Scalpel sharp enough
to cut humans and kittens in half
with minimal effort and near-to-no
stirring of agitated bodies.
Residue is painful though,
bleeding and abandoned
litter of the future,
delayed once more.
Look at the trains leaving,
look at them go.
Look at the unsaid
hovering above the sleepers.
Just say no, wait for the next
galaxy to be born,
to breathe in and out. Wait
for the next slow death.
Gnats
Sunday, 11 May 2008
Arachnophilia
I search for your nocturnal self among the spiders in the attic,
my fingers grope in the deep indigo of this dream, but you do not show.
Perhaps you are still on a caravan journey through the desert,
letting books rot away on the shelf.
Were you looking for shells on the beach, did you wear a dress
even in that scorching heat? I could have been your husband
making huts from twigs I found in the sand. I swam
in the folds of your dress. Songs would have issued from heaven.
Could have. Time is never ripe. We are still such mindful creatures
and do not heed that quiet command.
See the trembling cealing. We walk sideways and askew
in separate corridors, like halting spiders, awkard and silent.
my fingers grope in the deep indigo of this dream, but you do not show.
Perhaps you are still on a caravan journey through the desert,
letting books rot away on the shelf.
Were you looking for shells on the beach, did you wear a dress
even in that scorching heat? I could have been your husband
making huts from twigs I found in the sand. I swam
in the folds of your dress. Songs would have issued from heaven.
Could have. Time is never ripe. We are still such mindful creatures
and do not heed that quiet command.
See the trembling cealing. We walk sideways and askew
in separate corridors, like halting spiders, awkard and silent.
Satie
Echoing the vein, the pang:
the slow lightning, the gentle
catastrophe, nothing
as purple was ever said.
Had I been stroking
his cloudy beard,
taken his glasses off,
scalpelled his heart out,
it wouldn’t have given me this.
I couldn’t burn
more slowly. You are
eating your sallad
in retrograde, lifting
stains with your mouth.
Tongue ever more
tasteless, hands growing
shyer, smaller,
infinitely retreating, breathing
in. Every fifth year the sun
expands, every fifth year
exhales.
Reaching an empty
stomach, so it might begin
again. It doesn’t help.
Satie is always
delayed. Like my age,
dreaming of unspoiled
fruit, a healthy seed,
neutral to music, the prejudice,
all our love, and taking
its time. Fine cigars
appease us, stately names,
e-mail replies
from presidents. Our bodies
never were in such wealth,
never so photographed.
Worshipping wounds
grown invisible,
we put on
our dresses
and another CD
of Satie –
Lunch will ever come,
will ever throw
dressing on our trousers.
How non-metaphorical
were those headaches
brought on by sullied clothes?
How far from a Jesus stain
in your crotch, the singing
which cannot stop.
the slow lightning, the gentle
catastrophe, nothing
as purple was ever said.
Had I been stroking
his cloudy beard,
taken his glasses off,
scalpelled his heart out,
it wouldn’t have given me this.
I couldn’t burn
more slowly. You are
eating your sallad
in retrograde, lifting
stains with your mouth.
Tongue ever more
tasteless, hands growing
shyer, smaller,
infinitely retreating, breathing
in. Every fifth year the sun
expands, every fifth year
exhales.
Reaching an empty
stomach, so it might begin
again. It doesn’t help.
Satie is always
delayed. Like my age,
dreaming of unspoiled
fruit, a healthy seed,
neutral to music, the prejudice,
all our love, and taking
its time. Fine cigars
appease us, stately names,
e-mail replies
from presidents. Our bodies
never were in such wealth,
never so photographed.
Worshipping wounds
grown invisible,
we put on
our dresses
and another CD
of Satie –
Lunch will ever come,
will ever throw
dressing on our trousers.
How non-metaphorical
were those headaches
brought on by sullied clothes?
How far from a Jesus stain
in your crotch, the singing
which cannot stop.
Sticking to Fingers
Things
you cannot read, like forbidding
grass, steps over a lawn.
So is the touch
emphatically not erotic,
like glueing one’s eyes to the sea.
Unforgettable, friendly
pat on a knee, things you cannot
see, or read without embarrassment:
Lack without precedent,
overabundence.
Not the longing
for a ripe and life-long
waist embrace, unreadable anyway,
like the sustenance of fiords.
Only the thing, the just
do it: The thing I want
without being ironic.
you cannot read, like forbidding
grass, steps over a lawn.
So is the touch
emphatically not erotic,
like glueing one’s eyes to the sea.
Unforgettable, friendly
pat on a knee, things you cannot
see, or read without embarrassment:
Lack without precedent,
overabundence.
Not the longing
for a ripe and life-long
waist embrace, unreadable anyway,
like the sustenance of fiords.
Only the thing, the just
do it: The thing I want
without being ironic.
My Truly Warmest
Not a hole in my heart exactly, no white noise,
I can bleed no more for no-one.
No bullet through my head, unbearable shame,
there is no no-name unspeakable.
No impossibility, no slashing of wrists in moonlight
and no no-one to blame.
My entrails are all inside, so how do I describe this
giddy fold of flesh, fresh shudder of happy
shrapnel, gentle Angst. Changing cells
from the inside, you are a beautiful mistake.
Fate gone awry, new rivers
carving out a dapple-drawn morning.
Falcon dawn, cracking open
the ancient geode, gold vermilion.
Saturday, 10 May 2008
Strangeness
I will not impose my strangeness
on your straight self, secure
and uninterested. This flame
cannot be sustained
by a few strands of hair
in your sofa bed,
or by the ambiguity
of a stray word like
girlfriend.
(Sad Kitteh original here)
on your straight self, secure
and uninterested. This flame
cannot be sustained
by a few strands of hair
in your sofa bed,
or by the ambiguity
of a stray word like
girlfriend.
(Sad Kitteh original here)
The Planets
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