march 2018
(i)
...herein lie the fragments of a thousand centuries
strange, audacious sounds
words, words for anaesthesia,
words for glory, for secrets, anecdotes, spells
even for angst
words for anything which can charm thoughts
from this dense mass of air
where even utterances can fool our curiosity
and yet, irresistibly, still prowl the void
in search of fragments
those minds that constantly
call out from the grave
forcing books to disintegrate
in our hands as we read
lured, yes, we are always lured
by this strange, feverish audacity
that makes our faces glow
and the rains turn into laughter
whenever we squeeze a little immortality
out of each and every guttural sound...
(ii)
...often I look for the meteor, the arrow and its art
for the unexpected rhythm
the four, maybe five, notes
of some dark, diatonic dance
that slams my whole being into a wall
and lets loose a deepening truth inside the old
a raw light that firestorms
cascades and breaches
the cold frontiers of my mind
setting heaven’s empty thrones ablaze
and as the meteor’s flames move the darkness even closer
their art takes human form
I am the son and the daughter of no-one
I am the meteor’s child
the unexpected arrow
the dust blowing out to sea
a rhythm that slams
a wall ablaze
a vessel for whom the truth is never enough...
(iii)
...our love needs no deserving, no identity, no forgiving
for no-one has ever, or will ever survive its cruelty
love is surely just a foothold
a bridge to that lethal world of uncertainty
standing beside the Rubicon
unable to turn back
unable to step across
this necklace of burning suns
these raging galaxies that throw out
edict after edict, which
five billion years later
is driving our species insane
standing on the bridge
waiting for love’s signal
a kiss that enshrines
the heartache and the bliss
those two cruel, burning uncertainties
who sit at fortune’s wheel
spinning it, tempting it
first one way, then the other...
(iv)
...I have always walked and walked to find my life
to quieten the spectres
to savour the gratuities
but always, as I stride
enormous teeth have risen from the ground
and I have felt the world to be one gigantic mouth
a system of mere universal digestion
a meal at an empty table
that claims to recycle every conscious mind
and even more, to replace each living cell
with one immense, yet invisible star
that’s torn by vivid apparitions of unfolding space
by sights pretending to hold back the darkness
but, unconvinced, I keep moving
and push between the vast, dreamlike teeth
certain such things simply cannot be
what in that case, I ask, is the purpose of reality
to love and love again
to sleep and sleep again
or just to keep on swallowing the spectres
and walk, walk, walk...