Sophistry (For the War Effort)

It would take a leap of faith the length of the Euphrates

And the Grand Canyon combined.

It would take a regression to early stages of development.

And a deep reluctance to think,

To accept this.

 

Straight-faced they deliver their lines, well rehearsed.

Straight from their saintly hearts

They pour out their grief for the victims, the oppressed,

The downtrodden, the gassed, the dead.

I don’t accept this.

 

Deaf to the voices of millions, tuned in to the business of war,

They quietly agree contracts.

Death in the name of freedom sounds the rallying cry:

We can hammer them into love

For our emancipation.

 

Bleeding-heart conservatives declare their outrage

At atrocities committed

On the sands above these Fields; at the cruelty dished out

By shadows using fear (paid for

In dollars and pounds).

 

So now it’s time for a merger, a hostile takeover.

A stripping of assets.

Personnel had to go in this public downsizing,

While the CEO and his coterie

Cried freedom.

Powermurderoil

So. Now there’s a Humanitarian Aid contingency plan.

Let’s rip the skin off the bastards; the younger the better.

And then soothe them with balm.

Like that girl.

On that road.

In Vietnam.

Just Me, You and the Striplight

Stilted talk,

Behind glasses.

Filled with both our poisons to anaesthetise ourselves

From each other.

Flickering light, wavering nerves on ice

Begging understanding across the kitchen table at

Hazy 2a.m.

Bloodshot avoided eye contact,

Blinklight frays the nerves.

 

Jarred emotion,

Empty glasses.

Raw rejection filled with poison alienates ourselves

From ourselves.

Flickering light undermines the best

Of intentions, intermittently strobing us,

Demanding our response.

Sourness emits from the bottle.

Bitterness taints the words.

 

And talk we do,

Through prisms

Of betrayals, disappointments, unfulfilled demands

Of each other.

Flickering light throws shadow into relief

And shades of meaning become more than they were;

Demanding some response.

A grudging realisation.

And then the light goes out.

Outsiders

From the backstreet into the grimy entrance,

To sign a false name in the book. Any name.

A quickstep into joylessness, from dark into half-light

Where the floor sticks to your shoes.

 

Threat hangs vaguely, non-specific,

Something hovers.

Though I’ve never seen it here, I’ve sensed it.

 

Everything’s downbeat bar the beat.

The place seems barely functional in this light.

Filled with depressed misfits, thugs, thieves (and us!)

Here we drink without joy.

 

A place so sexless, unerotic

(Unless transactive).

At least I’ve heard it’s here, on offer.

 

Atomised groups locked in mortal dialogue,

Important and petty alike; intense both.

A foray into deep meaning, of a submerged existence;

Conspiratorial mumblings.

 

Jukebox mingles with murmur-static,

Undermining

The drone of life’s stasis.

 

But is that how it really is?

If most are beat, few are beaten, despite all

Appearances to the contrary; there’s a spark here.

Unrecognised elsewhere, maybe.

Detritus

An empty glass standing

On a table full

Of junk.

No photographs or anything

To remind you of

Anything,

Just detritus from days,

Weeks, months

And years.

The glass stands empty,

The bottle half full.

The table overflows.

Living Among Fragments

Living among Fragments,

Moving within shadows;

Not sightless, though not quite seeing.

A silhouette among silhouettes

Making out outlines

While anxiety neurosis makes inroads

To the fragility of trying to be.

Walking on rice paper

Leaving no trace.

Or walking on water with no trace to make.

Big noises make the least impression.

Sometimes.

Sightless in Gaza (2003)

What hope the next generations?

What hope is there for all of us

When life is rendered

So devoid of meaning

That a ten-year-old girl

Can have her sight shot out

In the middle of a lesson?

And the gunmen shrug their shoulders

 

The West stands by without concern

As if the countless deaths of innocents

The ceaseless struggles

Are so insignificant

That a ten-year-old boy

Can have his life shot out

For throwing stones at tanks.

And the killers claim self-defence.

 

A small girl, realising her fate, breaks down

Hysterical, inconsolable in her terror,

Her uncomprehending grief.

She is guilty as charged

Of being what she is

And had her life shot up

For precisely that

While the bulldozers circle town.

 

Her name is Huda, if you want to know.

Not that those who shot her

Could care a shot

If she lives or dies

Or goes to hell

With her light shot out

And nothing left but grief

While the West looks the other way.

Mirrors

You’re a bubbling mass, a boiling frenzy of hatred. You hardly know what it is you despise, its focus has been lost in such a maelstrom of seething emotion. From id to eternity you have almost lost control of the rampaging, destructive emotions that rage barely beneath the surface, half contained, constantly straining to be unleashed. Held in check (just), all this undermining negativity threatens to overwhelm you or at least expose you before the civilized world in the harsh glare of your pathological state. Do you yearn to be free of those impulses? Do you long to break free of their grasp? Do you want to eject them or are they too deep-rooted, too habitual? A primary ego-feeling like this is restricted by, and in turn restricts, your abilities – and otherwise – to connect, to make connections, to make contact. Unless negative. In this you are comfortable. Connection remains elusive until the visceral, red-faced, eye-bulging rage rips through the surface and roars without control at the object of real, palpable hatred. Rage rules uncontested. And so it goes.

Dogmoments

Snap. And that’s it. Where it comes from I’ll never know.

In a mere second. Just like that;

Swing into a storm of slavering, seething fury

Over nothing. It’s a dogmoment.

Remember him? That’s how he did it. Right in your face.

An inch from your face.

Howling, uncontrollable.

And the baton is carried on. Or perhaps the yoke is borne.

No! Not just like him. Not just like that.

Hiding behind that is no longer an option

Or acceptable.

Now it’s me.

Like a genetic defect.

Sketch from Bristol Bridge 1

Upright standing wooden block,

Cables threading downwards

Plucked to within an inch of themselves.

Let’s rock

Let’s groove

Let’s wind up.

And Down

Sketch from Bristol Bridge 2

Harbour lights, shimmering in water,

Green against murky brown.

Boats float on serene grunge

While red and yellow lights dance.

Elongated strip lights look tranquil reflected in water.

Sultry

Red eyes in a red dress,

Bag, bulging, hangs from slim shoulder,

Adds to the charisma,

Sultry, pouting, mouth and attitude –

You’re beguiling tonight.

(I remember it like it was just now.

This makes it harder)

I watch you as you stand, waiting,

Not interacting,

Involved in thoughts

That I imbue with eroticism

And superimpose on you my own

Desires.

Meta

Crackling like a mind on amphetamines

And rushing headlong into disjointed thoughts,

I scribble whatever comes to mind.

A deep-rooted desire to capture an essence

Overtakes any sensibilities of form, subsumes any notion of metre or rhythm.

Yet it creates a rhythm all of its own, one that I like

Because it drives itself.

Naive maybe, but dynamic also in its own insistence.

So it is. So it is.

Is this a meta-poem?

I hope so, that’d make me clever.