Fifty Eight Pound Hat From Paris

My garden is a saucer of green
The compost a downturned cup
Seeping wriggly nursery food
For the blackbirds fat children.

Orange beaked Mamma’s on guard;
I sit in my summer hat,
its flowerbed mimicry
Doesn’t fool her.

Albertropolis

(Daquise, 1974)

The sun is out in rosy Albertropolis
so tables in their white tablecloths
slide onto amber pavements
under swishing trees and sparkling leaves.

Here we two sit,
Wendy Kellerman and me
tackling intricate Polish cakes,
Russian teas, frothy coffees

like continentals, sexy Parisians
talking poetry. At the next table
sunk deep in newspapers
a man is eavesdropping.

His eyes creep over the top
of his crossword, tiptoe back again,.
he pats himself down inwardly,
leans over, butts in, introduces himself :

A Famous English Poet.
This tactic must miss more times than hit
but today is his lucky day!
as here we are, two teenage literary romantics,

Wendy, statuesque and gothic
dressed as usual in a wedding dress,
the dirty virgin Bride of Usher ,
white transparent broderie anglaise

can barely bear the weight
of all her deep black hair,
and me, as her friend, I don't need to dress up,
she's good looking enough for the both of us.

As if we doubt him (we do)
he flourishes his chequebook,
shows us the printed name, and there it is,
You-Know-Who, The Big Bad Wolf.

We remain unmoved, let him
draw out the afternoon, top up our coffees,
teas, cakes; we try to uncover him
with trick questions of increasing tactlessness.

At six o clock we feel the fat warmth of evening
calling, how easily we move through it,
fleet footed on tubes and buses,
without caring, without planning.

We leave behind the Famous English Poet
or the bearer of his name, his table
a desolation of patisserie,
crumpled linen, broken tarts.

Tulsi Dances

One today, and Tulsi dances,

to a Bangra beat,

in Dad’s embrace bright-eyed

her hand held high.

Passing this precious parcel

arm to arm, disarmed

privileged friends, family,

briefly hold

a living miracle.

The music of their hearts

stops when they pass her on,

but share — the other’s heart

takes up the song.

Fruit-decorated cake

with blow-out candles.

Fingerfuls of sweetness

feed the faces of delighted family.

Balloons, and bubbles,

reflecting light and bright

satin colours,

orbs of momentary joy,

bursting, bang,

or soapy pop — a shock;

a weary Tulsi tear

of disappointment;

orbs of light she sees

can never fright.

Grandparents dote,

Mother glories, Dad is

justified in pride.

Their child of love

dispenses that

of which she’s made.

And we her devotees

enter her presence

and our god, goddess within

bows to the goddess

shining from her heart.

Highbury Fields

They rim an old London plague pit
and behind window spectacles
the houses of Highbury fields

are still thinking ; they watch us
pounce on misty tennis courts,
take our chances, roads crisscrossing.

Every morning on Highbury fields
I’d bump into a drinker woman and her Doberman,
both of them jaundiced eyed.

One drunk day she stabbed her lover dead;
lesbians, I read later, no mention of the dog-
and that was it, we didn’t see her again.

We give London its soul, yes
even boring old us,
London built on London dust.

Our sad little trysts are ghosts on the pavement,
London Brick, coral with kisses,
London railings, black with black dogs.

A Woodland Burial

The day before the big snow
Out in the cold new woods
Her casket softened with feathers
She dropped under the forest floor.

Among the anonymous trees
(And, later there will be bluebells)
I tried hard to think of the dead
Instead of my freezing toes.

But now she comes back to me
Night by night, flake by flake,
Tumbling boldly into my eyes
Stung open by the brilliance of her-

Well, she was a trapeze artist,
Death dealt her a serious magic.
Now, in its slow reveal,
Here is the full wonder of her.

A Matter of Form

Stephen asked me to upload the Contribution Form for your access. I tried to do it, but it would not work. There is no provision for file retrieval here on blogger. So I failed to upload it as a PDF. It can't be done because blogger doesn't recognise the format as valid. So I decided to convert it to .jpg.

The resulting file is low quality, but can be accessed for printing by clicking on the image above.

Hole

All morning long it’s dripped away
A leakage in my memory;
I search the pipe work in my brain
But can’t find where it’s coming from.

All afternoon it laps away,
It draws across my memory
Leaving nothing in its tide
But scratches in my psychic eye.

I send the plumber of my thoughts
To climb inside the cavity.
There it finds a historic bleed
Encased inside my last nights dream. .

Together now my thoughts and I,
We lay this capsule in my hand,
We tap its shell, remove its head
Stagger back, hit by the smell

And as we try to see what’s what
Under all that sticky mess
Some tiny nasty thing crawls out
Shakes itself and flits away.

New Year Resolution 2010

May all conflict be resolved peacefully,

and all exploitation revealed and overturned.

May all harm intended be reflected by the mirror of the innocent,

and all darkness illuminated.

May all that has been hidden be disclosed.

May all manipulation and control be wrested from power.

May those offering freedom and ascension openly walk among us,

and abundance and joy be our experience every moment.

I resolve to welcome and empower these changes.