No Pablo Neruda
Essays on life, work and literatureArchive for June, 2009
Hello Unfinished Novel
It’s been a while since we last kept
Close company in daylight hours
Or twilight dinners where we swept
The dirty plates onto the tiles
It’s been a while since you and I
Would dance in moonlight coloured groves
A while since you said ‘stay a while’
And I danced on tippy toes
What happened to those cherished days
When you and I were soft, imbued
With love and wrapped in summer hazes
Of courtship, out soft souls denuded
I miss you so, I miss you dear
I want to take your sweet caress
And put it on my rising bosom
Feel it holding up my breast
In absence of this closest love
That above all things is most resplendant
I feel ill at ease, and lost and lonely
And all my cautious hope is ended.
Oh to be a backpacker..
My job is dull
my job is like putting one’s head in a deep granite bowl
and listening to the sound of air ringing against your ear drums
my job is like laying on one’s back on rough carpet
and having a bad violinist play long discordant chords while leaning over your face
on bad days, my job is like a insomnia and the loss of a loved one
my job alternates between a clutching desperation as if
someone has pulled strings tightly at the top my heart
closing it up like an empty purse
and a desire for sleep that crowds the bottom lip of my eyelids and makes them red.
My job is dull
it is monotonous, it is uninspiring, it is practical,
it is sensible, it is adult,
it is hard.
But I feel lucky,
just to have it.
I feel, now and again, a soft, tender feeling for the workplace
as if it has been carved just for me
as if I am a playing card with my hands stretched out above my head
supported on all sides by other cards
who collectively create towers.
But if I leave the rest will not topple,
only I will be dislocated from my place in the pack -
the card you see in gutters or folded up in garden debris by roadsides
not serving its purpose.
Guest Author: The Mysterious G
For Grace Seccombe
Smallest objects,
crackle-glaze,
years neglected:
kitsch-thought craze.
Spirits fine
and delicate,
quirky, native, intricate.
Retro throws
ironic sense
on your kiln’s
incandescence.
Mighty Fish God
Today I’ll try to believe in God
For a moment or a while
To see how His trees look
He and His patriarchy
For a while I’ll believe
Like fish might believe
In a fish God whose tail
Creates currents and ripples
In the water they breathe.
Welcome to the Circus
Afraid I do offend my friend
I fret by towers days on end
Afraid I do, wine request
Of friends the things, and then regret
By towers, bowls and dirty towels
By cigarettes and bread gone foul
I do offend, I do offend,
I do afear I irk my friend.
Your claim I know not how to press
What to do, what do I next
I confess I will not ask
For FAQ on ending tasks
And so time goes by and by and by
Without product and I lie
And lie and lie and lie
That things are all in perfect line.
What do I do when I am tired
And poetry is uninspired?
Green leaves are falling down
But none are on the ground
They’re collected up by eager hands
By trips and bottles, books and bands.
But a book of leaves it will require
To leave and be inspired
To leave and to be forced to be
Fearless, brave and worry free
But all the leaves are falling down
none collecting on the ground
I am turned around and round
To the desperate silent sound.
