Saturday 23 July 2011

Plastic Dolls

I love serious young girls,
so adamant they're women,
so drunk
on their own little experience,
that first little hit
of wine.

They brood and they
sulk, and their shoulders
are cold,
their moods
are precious flowers,
not flowering
in their own gardens.

Light them up
in sexual experience,
and they will go out
quickly
like a blanketed flame,
their warmth not kept
by the coals of passion.

The Madness of the Crowd

I'd rather have
solitude for a companion
than
several hundred
loose talkers,
dancing siphers,
merchants of
alcohol lip-service.

Why join the crowd,
barbaric,
idiotic,
when you could
fester alone,
in a more civilised
fashion?

Then again,
I'm not Bukowski -
I've got a long way to go
yet.

Tuesday 19 July 2011

Life is

one man
eating alone.

Life is a man
at shopfront doors
smiling
a weak smile,
wearing the face
of an organisation.


Life is a series of wins
clouded by ultimate defeat;
the loss of time
and everything sweet.


Grab onto its tail,
ride it -
try to avoid the horns.


(But they will get you
eventually.)

A Token

A cigarette
is a life:
born ready made, 
ready to be
lit.

But will you light it?

Burning down to the nub,
its amber eye
slowly dying,
being smoked
of its will.

It was lit.

Born ready made,
a beautiful thing to hold,
to feel
between your lips,
but never a cigarette
until met by flame.

Will it, light it.

Killed by flame,
born in flame,
dependent on flame,
fearing flame,
loving flame,
it is a beautiful thing.

But will you light it?

Monday 18 July 2011

It Comes

The worms are squirming
under the house,
down
under the house.

The weeds are rising
up
through the concrete,
the dandelions rise.

Frost-thaw is
breaking
the roads,
cracking
the roads.

Humanity
is
such a heavy load.

Requiem for the Living

Modernism's return,
the fatigue of existence,
bury the living
in hopelessness,
flowers might grow from dreams,
the death of the eternal
zero point
might sow a vision.

Eyes fixed on the distance,
the grave invisible,
the horn of death now
so clear
and so loud.

The marching has begun.
But where are the marchers?

Steel, Flowers, Future (eternal life)

Whatever the crest,
I shall be riding it,
borne forwards
by the winds of destiny

triumphantly,
eternally,
the 21st
century.

(Only kidding.)

My Gift

With poems of clothes
I spin myself a gown,
I wear these colours
for you:

I hope you like them.

Free

Water and a seat,
a river and a log;
the sea of the sea,
the bog of the bog.

That's all right for me -
I claim my claim;
I get mine for free,
give each
its given name.

My City

The strange thing about Brighton is
that everyone takes it so slow,
the buffalo
stampede
so quietly here.

Any other city
would spin on its head,
its thread
threaded
that much tighter;

but Brighton is quieter,
slighter,
mightier

than any city on wheels.

Brighton is a hush
of colourful mouths,
a blush
of colourful blouse,
the rush
of a single mouse,

but, my god,
it seems to press in
so tight.

Friday 15 July 2011

You're Invited

Empty laughter
comes from the fullest lips,
and pointed fingers
grow like sunflowers
from the gentlest hands,
their large 
yellow eyes
like beads watching the sun.

Bukowski

If a child could write,
Bukowski.

If innocence,
tarred black,
glistened white
beneath the moon,
Bukowski.

If a child's words
were knives
and it
spat
at the womb,

Bukowski.

Youth (for Hank)

youth
is a white horse
running into the hills.

as it runs,
its legs become
supple, strong,
terse,
like the tendons running through
the most brilliantly simple prose.

but then lines begin to develop,
sink
into furrows,
its legs buckle.

it dies thirsty
beside the clearest stream
never seen,
and the nomad's eyes
weep

as he looks on
past this scene of loss
to the gloaming
descending down
on
the white fields of nirvana.

Thursday 14 July 2011

The Calling

my heart aches,
my heart sings,
my heart wants to
leave
the confines of
whatever four walls
pin it in.

I have 
a higher 
spiritual calling.

a moment in suspension

a cloudy sky is powerful:
there's unbroken tension in it;
the colours like a bruised thumb,
some god's thumb,
some inker's thumb,
tinker's thumb,
that bruise spilled outward
as clouds
in the act of creation.

crepuscular rays come and go
as cumulus stray,
and the sun blends 
the earth
in yellow yolk.

A bright reflection,
a sky full of tension,
a moment
in suspension.

The 80s

Duran Duran
were hungry like the worm,
their eternal squirm
a squelching in my ears.

Tears for Fears,
the eighties peel
away, old wallpaper
not pasted sufficiently.

Come on down to
the Waterfront
to drown yourself
or drink to your health.

And maybe you'll see
the iron skull
of Mrs Thatcher
glaring back at yer,

the sea the colour
of bad money,
slowly bruising grey
under a perfect sun.

Monday 11 July 2011

On the organisation of words


If you were to look up my bowel
you’d find
the ugliness
of bad punctuation:

distended hyphens
with gaping mouths
and dumb
pointing fingers:
look at me,
I lead you somewhere
and I’ll show you where.

All you need
is commas
and full stops.
Semi-colons
are for the faint of heart.
Hyphens are like
boulders
perturbing the stream.

To dream, to dream, to dream,
perchance to write,
beautiful, complete sentences
that speak and give light;

but sometimes
you have to break your own
rules.

The ugliness of extrapolation


A galaxy at one end
a turd at the other;
light shines on all,
and what a shame that is.

In Archibald MacLeash's breast pocket


Poetry is like a flower:
its conditions for growth are
invisible perfections
and its season lasts
only so an hour.

Poetry sweeps the air
in searching for the sun
but often finds
only dust.

A ragged wound
in pain is spun,
its petals blossom
out and red.

Poetry is like a flower
bled of its essence,
yet still it stands,
its story to shower.

Poetry is a flower, a flower
only to show;
to tell would be impossible:
it has no mouth, only hands

and to touch
is to know.

Capable

The universe is absurd,
which is why we must
fight
against it.

The universe is quite beautiful,
which is why
it’s so painful
to conceive of.

Like angels born of flame,
a heavy mix
of fire and ice;
darkness and light
the name of the game –
tunnelled towards death
like weary-pawed mice.

The swagger of youth,
the dreams, in fancy dream’d,
snagged by the root,
an idle spray of leaves.

Do all you must,
the power in your hands
is like cutting, jagged dust
calling you to make a stand.

Each day is like a howl
from the lonely wolf’s lungs,
as, alone, your time you prowl,
each hour its only one.

The universe is absurd,
which is why we must
fight
against it.

The universe is quite beautiful,
which is why
it’s so painful
to conceive of.