The night started slowly as we just sat and talked
We were waiting for our friends to arrive
We figured they’d be here by about half-past eight
As neither had finished work till gone five.

But the bottles of wine were lined up in rows
There were reds and roses, and there were whites
And as neither of our friends had arrived yet
Those bottles were full and clearly in our sights.

So we opened a red and a white one too
Mine a Shiraz, for I like a good red
My wife, well she started the white one
As a Pinot she much favours instead.

And the time it just got that much later
But our friends well they still hadn’t come
And as each of us was drinking the vino
Well it’s nice to raise a glass with a chum.

In the end our friends never did show up
It was next week not this, we were dorks
But we drank all the wine and enjoyed it
And now we’re just left with the corks.



©Joe Wilson – The wine bottle corks…2014

A Child’s Story

Hamelin Town’s in Brunswick,
By famous Hanover city;
The river Weser, deep and wide,
Washes its wall on the southern side;
A pleasanter spot you never spied;
But, when begins my ditty,
Almost five hundred years ago,
To see the townsfolk suffer so
From vermin, was a pity.

Rats!
They fought the dogs, and killed the cats,
And bit the babies in the cradles,
And ate the cheeses out of the vats,
And licked the soup from the cook’s own ladles,
Split open the kegs of salted sprats,
Made nests inside men’s Sunday hats,
And even spoiled the women’s chats,
By drowning their speaking
With shrieking and squeaking
In fifty different sharps and flats.

At last the people in a body
To the Town Hall came flocking:
“’Tis clear,” cried they, “our Mayor’s a noddy;
And as for our Corporation—shocking
To think we buy gowns lined with ermine
For dolts that can’t or won’t determine
What’s best to rid us of our vermin!
You hope, because you’re old and obese,
To find in the furry civic robe ease?
Rouse up, Sirs! Give your brains a racking
To find the remedy we’re lacking,
Or, sure as fate, we’ll send you packing!”
At this the Mayor and Corporation
Quaked with a mighty consternation.

An hour they sate in council,
At length the Mayor broke silence:
“For a guilder I’d my ermine gown sell;
I wish I were a mile hence!
It’s easy to bid one rack one’s brain—
I’m sure my poor head aches again
I’ve scratched it so, and all in vain.
Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap!”
Just as he said this, what should hap
At the chamber door but a gentle tap?
“Bless us,” cried the Mayor, “what’s that?”
(With the Corporation as he sat,
Looking little though wondrous fat;
Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister
Than a too-long-opened oyster,
Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous
For a plate of turtle green and glutinous)
“Only a scraping of shoes on the mat?
Anything like the sound of a rat
Makes my heart go pit-a-pat!”

“Come in!”—the Mayor cried, looking bigger:
And in did come the strangest figure!
His queer long coat from heel to head
Was half of yellow and half of red;
And he himself was tall and thin,
With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin,
And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin,
No tuft on cheek nor beard on chin,
But lips where smiles went out and in—
There was no guessing his kith and kin!
And nobody could enough admire
The tall man and his quaint attire:
Quoth one: “It’s as my great-grandsire,
Starting up at the Trump of Doom’s tone,
Had walked this way from his painted tombstone!”

He advanced to the council-table:
And, “Please your honours,” said he, “I’m able,
By means of a secret charm, to draw
All creatures living beneath the sun,
That creep or swim or fly or run,
After me so as you never saw!
And I chiefly use my charm
On creatures that do people harm,
The mole and toad and newt and viper;
And people call me the Pied Piper.”
(And here they noticed round his neck
A scarf of red and yellow stripe,
To match with his coat of the selfsame cheque;
And at the scarf’s end hung a pipe;
And his fingers, they noticed, were ever straying
As if impatient to be playing
Upon this pipe, as low it dangled
Over his vesture so old-fangled.)
“Yet,” said he, “poor piper as I am,
In Tartary I freed the Cham,
Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats;
I eased in Asia the Nizam
Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats;
And, as for what your brain bewilders,
If I can rid your town of rats
Will you give me a thousand guilders?”
“One? fifty thousand!”—was the exclamation
Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation.

Into the street the Piper stepped,
Smiling first a little smile,
As if he knew what magic slept
In his quiet pipe the while;
Then, like a musical adept,
To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled,
And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled
Like a candle flame where salt is sprinkled;
And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered,
You heard as if an army muttered;
And the muttering grew to a grumbling;
And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling;
And out of the houses the rats came tumbling.
Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats,
Brown rats, black rats, grey rats, tawny rats,
Grave old plodders, gay young friskers,
Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins,
Cocking tails and pricking whiskers,
Families by tens and dozens,
Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives—
Followed the Piper for their lives.
From street to street he piped advancing,
And step for step they followed dancing,
Until they came to the river Weser,
Wherein all plunged and perished!
- Save one who, stout a Julius Caesar,
Swam across and lived to carry
(As he, the manuscript he cherished)
To Rat-land home his commentary:
Which was, “At the first shrill notes of the pipe
I heard a sound as of scraping tripe,
And putting apples, wondrous ripe,
Into a cider-press’s gripe:
And a moving away of pickle-tub-boards,
And a leaving ajar of conserve-cupboards,
And a drawing the corks of train-oil-flasks,
And a breaking the hoops of butter-casks;
And it seemed as if a voice
(Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery
Is breathed) called out ‘Oh, rats, rejoice!
The world is grown to one vast drysaltery!
So munch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon,
Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon!’
And just as a bulky sugar-puncheon,
All ready staved, like a great sun shone
Glorious scarce and inch before me,
Just as methought it said ‘Come, bore me!’
- I found the Weser rolling o’er me.”

You should have heard the Hamelin people
Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple.
“Go,” cried the Mayor, “and get long poles!
Poke out the nests and block up the holes!
Consult with carpenters and builders,
And leave in our town not even a trace
Of the rats!”—when suddenly, up the face
Of the Piper perked in the market-place,
With a, “First, if you please, my thousand guilders!”

A thousand guilders! The Mayor looked blue;
So did the Corporation too.
For council dinners made rare havoc
With Claret, Moselle, Vin-de-Grave, Hock;
And half the money would replenish
Their cellar’s biggest **** with Rhenish.
To pay this sum to a wandering fellow
With a gypsy coat of red and yellow!
“Beside,” quoth the Mayor with a knowing wink,
“Our business was done at the river’s brink;
We saw with our eyes the vermin sink,
And what’s dead can’t come to life, I think.
So, friend, we’re not the folks to shrink
From the duty of giving you something for drink,
And a matter of money to put in your poke;
But, as for the guilders, what we spoke
Of them, as you very well know, was in joke.
Beside, our losses have made us thrifty.
A thousand guilders! Come, take fifty!”

The Piper’s face fell, and he cried
“No trifling! I can’t wait, beside!
I’ve promised to visit by dinner-time
Bagdat, and accept the prime
Of the Head Cook’s pottage, all he’s rich in,
For having left, in the Calip’s kitchen,
Of a nest of scorpions no survivor—
With him I proved no bargain-driver,
With you, don’t think I’ll bate a stiver!
And folks who put me in a passion
May find me pipe to another fashion.”

“How?” cried the Mayor, “d’ye think I’ll brook
Being worse treated than a Cook?
Insulted by a lazy ribald
With idle pipe and vesture piebald?
You threaten us, fellow? Do your worst,
Blow your pipe there till you burst!”

Once more he stepped into the street;
And to his lips again
Laid his long pipe of smooth straight cane;
And ere he blew three notes (such sweet
Soft notes as yet musician’s cunning
Never gave the enraptured air)
There was a rustling, that seemed like a bustling
Of merry crowds justling at pitching and hustling,
Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clattering,
Little hands clapping and little tongues chattering,
And, like fowls in a farmyard when barley is scattering,
Out came the children running.
All the little boys and girls,
With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls,
And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls,
Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after
The wonderful music with shouting and laughter.

The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood
As if they were changed into blocks of wood,
Unable to move a step, or cry
To the children merrily skipping by—
And could only follow with the eye
That joyous crowd at the Piper’s back.
But how the Mayor was on the rack,
And the wretched Council’s bosoms beat,
As the Piper turned from the High Street
To where the Weser rolled its waters
Right in the way of their sons and daughters!
However he turned from South to West,
And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed,
And after him the children pressed;
Great was the joy in every breast.
“He never can cross that mighty top!
He’s forced to let the piping drop,
And we shall see our children stop!”
When, lo, as they reached the mountain’s side,
A wondrous portal opened wide,
As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed;
And the Piper advanced and the children followed,
And when all were in to the very last,
The door in the mountain-side shut fast.
Did I say, all? No! One was lame,
And could not dance the whole of the way;
And in after years, if you would blame
His sadness, he was used to say,—
“It’s dull in our town since my playmates left!
I can’t forget that I’m bereft
Of all the pleasant sights they see,
Which the Piper also promised me:
For he led us, he said, to a joyous land,
Joining the town and just at hand,
Where waters gushed and fruit-trees grew,
And flowers put forth a fairer hue,
And everything was strange and new;
The sparrows were brighter than peacocks here,
And their dogs outran our fallow deer,
And honey-bees had lost their stings,
And horses were born with eagles’ wings:
And just as I became assured
My lame foot would be speedily cured,
The music stopped and I stood still,
And found myself outside the Hill,
Left alone against my will,
To go now limping as before,
And never hear of that country more!”

Alas, alas for Hamelin!
There came into many a burgher’s pate
A text which says, that Heaven’s Gate
Opes to the Rich at as easy rate
As the needle’s eye takes a camel in!
The Mayor sent East, West, North, and South,
To offer the Piper, by word of mouth,
Wherever it was men’s lot to find him,
Silver and gold to his heart’s content,
If he’d only return the way he went,
And bring the children behind him.
But when they saw ’twas a lost endeavour,
And Piper and dancers were gone for ever,
They made a decree that lawyers never
Should think their records dated duly
If, after the day of the month and year,
These words did not as well appear,
“And so long after what happened here
On the Twenty-second of July,
Thirteen hundred and seventy-six”:
And the better in memory to fix
The place of the children’s last retreat,
They called it, the Pied Piper’s Street—
Where any one playing on pipe or tabor
Was sure for the future to lose his labour.
Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern
To shock with mirth a street so solemn;
But opposite the place of the cavern
They wrote the story on a column,
And on the great Church-Window painted
The same, to make the world acquainted
How their children were stolen away;
And there it stands to this very day.
And I must not omit to say
That in Transylvania there’s a tribe
Of alien people that ascribe
The outlandish ways and dress
On which their neighbours lay such stress,
To their fathers and mothers having risen
Out of some subterraneous prison
Into which they were trepanned
Long time ago in a mighty band
Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land,
But how or why, they don’t understand.

So, *****, let you and me be wipers
Of scores out with all men—especially pipers:
And, whether they pipe us free, from rats or from mice,
If we’ve promised them aught, let us keep our promise.

To whom it may concern,

     I am alone.  Although it may never quite seem that way, both night and day I am confined to solitude.  These past six years hitherto have been filled with nothing more than the fictional characters in my texts and the short pleasantries granted in passing by dismal men, women, and even children that occupy my days.  Each morning, as the dawn breaks, I wake up disgusted with myself in that same manner which sundry men and women have.  It is not the loneliness, however, that disgusts me.  No, I do believe I have grown quite fond of the residual silence.  Instead, I believe it to be the dull monotony of my routine that has left me truly disturbed.  The days have begun to fade in with each other, along with the nights---especially the nights.  I cannot say, for instance, whether or not it was last evening or that of a day three months afore that I was seated at my desk, much like I am now, finishing the latest draft of a poem in my journal.  Nor could I tell you the present date, although the heat of the day, still trapped in the rafters, is so persistent that I am obliged to say it must be one of those blue summer nights when children run, squealing, through the streets, like plump pigs to the trough.  I have become somewhat of a hermit, secluded in my small, run-down apartment above my bodega.  My mind has grown as wild as the violet petunias, bridging the gap over the narrow, brick walk which separates my garden--- as the myriad of dandelions that have invaded the surrounding lawn.
     Throughout the day I work the till in my shop, observing the assorted physiognomies that populate the three small isles.  As they walk up and down, deciding what they most desire, I, too, contemplate to myself, deciding the few whom I might admire should I get the chance.  I often attempt to strike up conversations with my customers, much to their dismay.  I comment on the weather, the soccer scores from a recent game, or perhaps a story from the local section of the Post & Courier, only to receive terse responses and short payments.  However, I never let these failed attempts at congenial conversation discourage me.  Day after day, I persist.
     The nights are easier.  Although I do not attend the boisterous bars spread out amongst the small restaurants and boutiques that line the narrow city streets as I once did, I often drink.  Seated alone, armed with a liter of Ri, two glasses, one with small cubes of ice and one without, and a pen; I waste my nights scribbling down nearly every thought that leaps into my inebriated mind.  My prose has yet to show any real promise, but my thirst to transcend from this pathetic, pseudo-intellectual literature student struggling with his thesis into something more drives me to ignore those basic desires, defined by Maslow as needs; venturing out and exploring the community that I inhabit or talking to another person as a friend.  So I sit, night after night, at the foot of this large bay window, looking out onto the tired faces of the busy street below.  I sit, night after night, tracing the streaks of red light from the tails of passing cars, imprinted in the backs of my eyelids like sand-spurs stuck in a heel.
     I can recall a time when my flat was not the dank, dimly lit hole in the wall that it has become today.  A time, not too distant, when the rich chestnut floorboards glistened beneath the fluorescent pendant lights, when champagne dripped like rain from the white coffers in the blue ceiling, and music shook the walls and rattled the windows.  Men and women alike would wander through the rooms, inoculated by my counterfeit Monet's and their glasses of box wine.  When not entertaining, I wrote.  At long length I sat beneath my window, proliferating prose or critiquing a classmate's from workshop, but those days have passed.  The floors no longer shine; instead they lay suffocating under piles of fetid clothes.  The halls no longer echo with the rhythmic chorus of an acoustic guitar or the symphonies of men and women's laughter;  the lights are burnt out, the paint is peeling off the walls, and the homages are concealed beneath vast fields of mildew and mold.  Puddles of whiskey sit unattended on the granite countertops around the bottoms of corks for weeks, allowing the strong scent to foster and waft freely through the air ducts into the store below.  The dilapidation that ensued after I stopped receiving visitors was not just of the home, however. Worse yet was the steady rot of my own mind.  Although I have often been referred to as "a bit eccentric," and often times folks would inquire if I had, "a ***** loose in [my] noggin," I have only recently begun to find myself walking about the neighborhood garden in the small hours of the morning more than occasionally.  Further still, it is only recently that I cannot remember how, or when, I came to be where I am. Whenever I do happen to roam the night, it appears as if I do it unbeknownst to myself, throughout the throes of my sleep.  Similarly, I have only just begun to notice that, often times while I attempt to write, I sit, talking feverishly---yelling at an empty bottle, until I find another to quench my thirst.  Luckily, there is always another bottle.
     Needless to say, these past few years have left me very tired, and, after much consideration, I have decided that it would be best if I were to "shuffle off this mortal coil."  However, much like Hamlet himself, I could never bring myself to act upon the feeling.  Though I often wonder about what awaits me after my last breath warms the winter of this world, the coward that I have become is in no hurry to find out.  Alors, I am left with one option: leave.  Though I am not yet brave enough to slip into that, the deepest of sleeps, I have gathered courage enough to walk throughout the day.
           Charon Solus

Corks of bottled pasts are popping,
Fury trains are slowing...
Stopping.
Recognise the ifs, the buts,
The wings, the ruts,
The shadows hopping.

Corks of bottled pasts are popping,
I'm a fury train and I need stopping.
Tinted blood,
Liver sopping,
Fetch a bucket,
It needs mopping.

Steam-rage bursts from veins and ears,
Peace erupts and all he hears?
"You've ****** me up for years and years,"
"For years and years and years and years!"

[Where is home?]
[Where is home?]
[Where is home?]
[Where is home?]
Not here,
So I'll destroy everything that you own.

"Restrain her!"
"Restrain her!"

Corks of bottled pasts are popping,
Fury trains are slowing...
Stopping.
Recognise the ifs, the buts,
The wings, the ruts,
The shadows hopping.
Boiling rows,
And dripping mouths,
And pools of vows
That now need mopping.

Buying a bottle was an adventure and she was always my plus one.
We plucked cork after cork, off the bottles, never thinking back.
Every bottle had a story and the corks we collected were the summaries.
Every cork was a memory, stored in a cage never to be revisited but always to be cherished.
Never to be forgotten, till the night came where she'd never again be my plus one.
Now I sit here with my glass empty, looking at a cage full of memories.
I can't start a new adventure alone nor can I keep this glass empty for long.

Everyone has that place they go to when the world is too much with them. Or at least, near everyone. Mine is dark, like the sea, and it’s full of stars. It’s not quiet. It’s endless and orchestral, swirling with symphonies that I haven’t quite heard yet, symphonies that are always just a galaxy out of reach.

And sometimes it’s full of fields. I’m from the city, but they feel like home. They circle me and the sky is blindingly blue and I count my breaths: One, Two, Three, and so on. Until softly the wind blows and there I can imagine a different sort of song -- it doesn’t elude me; it consumes me. It’s there in the breeze, in the drifting bits of dust and pollen and tiny particles of sunshine. It’s great and beautiful and the first song that anyone ever heard.

And every so often. Only every so often. That song changes. It’s still within reach, but it’s a different tune. The song is light with floating, glowing ash; it’s heavy with a million voices and laughs and other songs; it drips with summer drinks and rushes through my soul. I am not alone in some black, celestial ocean or alone in golden labyrinths; home is no imagined place, nor are others just comforting phantoms. I am with them. It is more breathtaking than the stars, and more blinding than the sky.

It was like this that my summer began. In musical swells of escapism, visions of melodramatic beauty, grander than my true surroundings. It was built up like Fitzgerald crafted the West Egg, and it nearly ended much the same way; a journey homewards marked with disillusionment.

First came the traveling. I had hoped to find something I’d lost, and started out my search in the throbbing streets of Barcelona, saturated with sunlight during the days and at night with the sounds from sports bars as the football games ended, or young lovers’ laughter along the clear, black Mediterranean coast. Even the most hushed, winding alleys were full of something; perhaps this was just some magical element I conjured to make every moment new and original.

In Spain I found sea food and chilled beer and a bright rose to color my cheeks. I found churches crafted with dizzying dedication, art that made my heart stop, that somehow filled the world with its own sort of symphony.

Then came Paris. There was wine, red and deep and romantic, wine that Hemingway might have brooded over, or that Audrey Hepburn could have brought to her lips on some glamorous getaway from her Roman home. I found walls too, covered with Degas, with Monet and Manet alike, with Da Vinci and the rest. I discovered what it feels like to survey the Luxembourg Gardens on a July day, from a high shady point where despite denim shorts and a boulangerie sandwich, you’re aware that you’ve been graced with something that holds a euphoric regality.

And finally came a trip to Maine. On the shores of Bar Harbor I saw the endless pines and clear blue waters that spelled out the promised land for the first explorers. Atop Cadillac Mountain, as I burrowed into my father’s jacket and hid my face from the wind, I found the stars, as endless as I’d dreamt. They danced for me as for Van Gogh and I could have died up there. I found cool mornings to be filled with walks to rocky shores, and tea and berries and books. There was a different quality here than had been in my European travels. It was introspective and quiet aside from the chirps of crickets and birds and the laps of waves on dark cliffs. I loved it.

Each place held its own collection. Sand and shells and Spanish fans; metro tickets and corks and long linen dresses lightened on the bottom from the waters of the Seine; sea glass pulled from the harbor and dream catchers and endless dog-eared pages. Physical, tangible, ephemeral things for me to grasp onto. I added them to my character, grafted them to my bones, made them my own.

But what use is imagined significance; I hadn’t grown or changed or even learned what it was I had been looking for. I was several weeks older, I had seen a few more corners of the world, granted meaning to trinkets and decided they added to my worth.

It was August then. Shorter days for fluttering leaves and the understanding that nothing separated me from the person I had been aside from the hours between us. Direction in life can’t be dreamt up, it’s earned. It’s what you’re allowed to have after you’ve fallen down and picked yourself back up. I fell, but chose to imagine a new self in faraway places where my troubles couldn’t find me amidst the breezy, sunny crowds.

The cobblestone Parisian streets, the docks of Barcelona, the coves of Maine; they were only where I fled to when my own world was too much with me. When I couldn’t find any use in continuing as myself, I invented a girl laughing on the edge of l’Arc de Triomphe, wading quietly into the inky mystery of the warm sea, or hiding in pine forests with a copy of Wuthering Heights and a serious demeanor. She was the same girl that lost herself into empty fields and dark oceans of stars.

Only one thing stopped the self-absorption that had claimed me that summer. It was nothing fateful; nothing original. I didn’t traverse the world to see this, and the experience was not mine alone. It didn’t hold any old hollywood glamour, nor was it the topic of any of Hemingway’s books. Or maybe it was. It was true, after all. It was the truest thing I did the entire summer; it wasn’t adorned with portraits or cathedrals or soaring landscapes because it didn’t need to be. Hemingway, I think, might have liked that. What I’m going on about now is that Every-So-Often moment. It doesn’t stand lonely in my memory, like so many of the others might. It’s brimming not with strangers and false romantic visions, but with the company of those souls you’re allowed to feel like you’ve known for your entire life, for more than your entire life. The sounds of empty seas and shapeless symphonies have no part; instead, there’s the strumming of guitars with songs so familiar they place an ache right in the core of you. You ache because that moment, full of bonfire and friends and song, is becoming you in a way that nothing else could have (for all of your efforts). It’s a beautiful ache, the one you get when you’ve come home after a long time spent lost and away.

Marry me.
One day.
Keep me .
Captive.
No one else.
Can abduct me like you.
You embrace my faults.
You love my corks.
What is it like?
Too be loved this much?
When your inside
Can you feel it?
The longing for everything
All of you
Forever?
Are you scared?
I am.......
But its the type of horror that keeps you at the edge of your seat.
When your heart keeps beating at a rapid pace
And your palms stay moist
No matter how many times you wipe them
But you dont care because you'd rather have swetty palms
Than no one to hold at all
God its the fire that burns
behind your eyelids
Scorching hot
Just one look
Its the effortless
conversations that last until dusk
Until you both are slowly dozing off only too dream about  eachother
So scary
That one moment
Your worried all this stuf just a bunch of *******
But then someone comes and changes everything
You don't care about those meaningless things that  once seemed so important to you
They seem so tiny and insegnificant
Your the only thing I want to care about anymore...

I

There was an ancient City, stricken down
With a strange frenzy, and for many a day
They paced from morn to eve the crowded town,
And danced the night away.

I asked the cause: the aged man grew sad:
They pointed to a building gray and tall,
And hoarsely answered "Step inside, my lad,
And then you'll see it all."

Yet what are all such gaieties to me
Whose thoughts are full of indices and surds?

x*x + 7x + 53 = 11/3

But something whispered "It will soon be done:
Bands cannot always play, nor ladies smile:
Endure with patience the distasteful fun
For just a little while!"

A change came o'er my Vision - it was night:
We clove a pathway through a frantic throng:
The steeds, wild-plunging, filled us with affright:
The chariots whirled along.

Within a marble hall a river ran -
A living tide, half muslin and half cloth:
And here one mourned a broken wreath or fan,
Yet swallowed down her wrath;

And here one offered to a thirsty fair
(His words half-drowned amid those thunders tuneful)
Some frozen viand (there were many there),
A tooth-ache in each spoonful.

There comes a happy pause, for human strength
Will not endure to dance without cessation;
And every one must reach the point at length
Of absolute prostration.

At such a moment ladies learn to give,
To partners who would urge them over-much,
A flat and yet decided negative -
Photographers love such.

There comes a welcome summons - hope revives,
And fading eyes grow bright, and pulses quicken:
Incessant pop the corks, and busy knives
Dispense the tongue and chicken.

Flushed with new life, the crowd flows back again:
And all is tangled talk and mazy motion -
Much like a waving field of golden grain,
Or a tempestuous ocean.

And thus they give the time, that Nature meant
For peaceful sleep and meditative snores,
To ceaseless din and mindless merriment
And waste of shoes and floors.

And One (we name him not) that flies the flowers,
That dreads the dances, and that shuns the salads,
They doom to pass in solitude the hours,
Writing acrostic-ballads.

How late it grows! The hour is surely past
That should have warned us with its double knock?
The twilight wanes, and morning comes at last -
"Oh, Uncle, what's o'clock?"

The Uncle gravely nods, and wisely winks.
It MAY mean much, but how is one to know?
He opens his mouth - yet out of it, methinks,
No words of wisdom flow.

II

Empress of Art, for thee I twine
This wreath with all too slender skill.
Forgive my Muse each halting line,
And for the deed accept the will!

O day of tears! Whence comes this spectre grim,
Parting, like Death's cold river, souls that love?
Is not he bound to thee, as thou to him,
By vows, unwhispered here, yet heard above?

And still it lives, that keen and heavenward flame,
Lives in his eye, and trembles in his tone:
And these wild words of fury but proclaim
A heart that beats for thee, for thee alone!

But all is lost: that mighty mind o'erthrown,
Like sweet bells jangled, piteous sight to see!
"Doubt that the stars are fire," so runs his moan,
"Doubt Truth herself, but not my love for thee!"

A sadder vision yet: thine aged sire
Shaming his hoary locks with treacherous wile!
And dost thou now doubt Truth to be a liar?
And wilt thou die, that hast forgot to smile?

Nay, get thee hence! Leave all thy winsome ways
And the faint fragrance of thy scattered flowers:
In holy silence wait the appointed days,
And weep away the leaden-footed hours.

III.

The air is bright with hues of light
And rich with laughter and with singing:
Young hearts beat high in ecstasy,
And banners wave, and bells are ringing:
But silence falls with fading day,
And there's an end to mirth and play.
Ah, well-a-day

Rest your old bones, ye wrinkled crones!
The kettle sings, the firelight dances.
Deep be it quaffed, the magic draught
That fills the soul with golden fancies!
For Youth and Pleasance will not stay,
And ye are withered, worn, and gray.
Ah, well-a-day!

O fair cold face! O form of grace,
For human passion madly yearning!
O weary air of dumb despair,
From marble won, to marble turning!
"Leave us not thus!" we fondly pray.
"We cannot let thee pass away!"
Ah, well-a-day!

IV.

My First is singular at best:
More plural is my Second:
My Third is far the pluralest -
So plural-plural, I protest
It scarcely can be reckoned!

My First is followed by a bird:
My Second by believers
In magic art: my simple Third
Follows, too often, hopes absurd
And plausible deceivers.

My First to get at wisdom tries -
A failure melancholy!
My Second men revered as wise:
My Third from heights of wisdom flies
To depths of frantic folly.

My First is ageing day by day:
My Second's age is ended:
My Third enjoys an age, they say,
That never seems to fade away,
Through centuries extended.

My Whole? I need a poet's pen
To paint her myriad phases:
The monarch, and the slave, of men -
A mountain-summit, and a den
Of dark and deadly mazes -

A flashing light - a fleeting shade -
Beginning, end, and middle
Of all that human art hath made
Or wit devised! Go, seek HER aid,
If you would read my riddle!

They chase them down
through field and town
intending then to eat em'
with plastic forks
and champagne corks
they wallop and they beat em'

They chase by day
and most the night
though I can't understand em'
through thistle grass
and snowy pass
with knives they roughly brand em'

With Caber tossed
and y-fronts lost
these skirted men assault em'
big burly men
with beards yer ken
you really cannot fault em'

With claymore sharp
and Scottish harp
they catch and set to roast em'
with whiskey ryes
And blood shot eyes
these hunters fair do toast em'

Her figure, a fruit salad: little corks and knobs
jellyroll thighs and a smooth muffin top
unripe blueberries decorated here and there –
I would wrap my arms around her like a basket
protected from bruising or peaches robbed:
the perfect sphere unpeeled, pink honey bared.

Before you came,
the lighthouse.
   Aging, silently,
   saw it blink
   as if it knew me,
was stalking me,
a tiny inflamed eye.
   Reds popped as corks,
   smudge of blood
   on a north-eastern
summer sky.
And then,
   in a second
   as quick as a pulse
   on a wrist,
a flick to white,
a shard of champagne
   light latched
   upon my attention.
   Back to red.
And back again.
Two colours breathing in,
   blowing out,
   calling you.

I will plug
my tear ducts
with wine corks.

Races run
Medals won
Now before you go back across the sea
May I ask if you'll take some time
And come with me...

Let me say what's on my mind,
I find it hard to be too subtle
The sight of all that muscle
Turns my head I find...

I'm really thinking legacy
Specifically from  you  and me
I'm so glad we have connected
Could we perhaps play catch-up on the bits neglected...

We could take it nice and slow
Pop some corks, lights down low
Then dive into the midnight pool
Stir some genes around

Hell really, what's a girl to do
When her ideal partner's found?

I have this ticking bio clock
So will you fire me off the starting block?
This is what we could do-
Make olympic champion 2032

for all i care to remember...
        looking into the mirror was more or less...
something akin to:
"squirting"... **** me! SQUINTING...
      well... the contortion of the eyes...
"worrying" about a double-chin...
and of course... enough stealth acne
to make me... the bride of beelzebub
how i'd joke to myself...
         beelzebub sat on my face and *******
a tonne of... dead maggots...

           i never knew i was athletic standing
before a mirror...
i probably know that i am less athletic now...
but... looking into mirror made
sense... once...
   this russian girl...
    in st. petersburg...
   we were in "love"...
       and there was this great aventurine bed...
and... a closet with two mirrors...
and... we'd be at it...
i was looking into the mirror...
and she was looking into the mirror...
it was like: the opposite of *** on l.s.d. -
because it was like...
beyond the missionary -
the "******" of the mirror...
   as in ***... it leaves you wanting
to ******* to the *******...
because... hell...
without a mirror...
could you capture the face moaning
contorting like an experiment out
of the gehenna harem?

     for all the *** toys sold...
all those exceses of... woman's lingerie...
outfits... nurses...
   blah blah... it really takes a mirror
to spice things up...
this dead-eyed mirror canvas...
the dire-dead-necessary...
    tooth-fairy: ref. the red dragon...
i needed to see that she needed to see
that i was ******* her... and that she...
was being ******...

           mirror mirror on the wall...
**** the fair and the fairest and the fairies...
i have come to understand that mirrors...
work best...
when... not stressed to exemplify...
a concern for beauty...
   or... something that is worn...
clothes look... terribly important in a mirror...
esp. by someone wearing them
when allowed to be digested / investigated
by a mirror...

but... a mirror during ***?
when you're not performing inverted missionary...
doggy... and she's lying with clenched ****-cheeks...
i was in love once...
which also implies:
i ****** like a race-champ pony!
the mirror always helps...
i wouldn't know: whether s&m leather
and straps would... and whips...
made much of a difference...
when... the mirror... the ghost ******...
the: satan you could get away with...
if you didn't utter a comprehensive word...
but ensure a strict rigidity to...
onomatopoeias and syllables...
and... exfoliating nouns...

        upon memory being summoned...
i'm getting a bigger hard-on thinking
about all the encounters i've had with the police...
there's always at least two memorable
encounters...
getting poisoned in a nightclub...
getting on the bus...
getting off the bus... dropping like a pancake
onto the cement...
     being roused... asked by the police officer
whether i was o.k.:
making a slurred and lengthy apology...
giving my address...
and being... taken in a police van... in a cage
for a sinner... like a taxi...
back home...

    losing my virginity to a pair of handcuffs...
for ******* in an alleyway...
getting screamed at...
one officer cuffed me...
the female officer had a pen and pad ready...
in an alleyway where it was discussed:
and who's alleyway is it?
i'm too drunk already...
if i walked into a pub on friday come
10pm i'd be asked to buy a pint
in order to use their toilet...

         it's one sort of luck... gambling...
betting on a horse...
but another... being hand-cuffed...
  and then... having the hand-cuffs...
taken away...
              as this dialogue happened in the...
"invisible" shadow of the alley...
i can't exactly imagine what the onlookers
saw...
           a teasing of authority...
drinking a beer on a bench outside
a pub on a friday night...
which is... basically... taking away
the revenue... of being sardine packed...
and pyramid schemed... for failure...
but my... what a glorious night...

so i asked: and where am i... permitted...
and blah blah...
that ******* mirror... and that aventurine bed...
the same thrill during ***...
like... the thrill of stepping into a brothel...
without a need to ***...
the 9 of them: all nazgul attired in scrutiny...
before "the pick"...

   *** toys... can i please get a mirror in here?!
it has to become a standard for a healthy
sexed up relationship...
    a mirror can overpower any...
frivolity of during-***: attire...
  the imitation ******...
a mirror is... just that...
                 *** with: in third person narrative...
but... smirk-giggle:
you catching her eyes getting ******...
and she catching your eyes: ******* her...

so tame tame... unlike reading...
  the tame blushes of marquis the sade...
never to mention... this philosophical adventure
of ******... which it really is...
impeccable... trouble with: thought put into
practice...
                yes... that horrid... Fritzl case...
but unlike the idealist scenario...
the mother was notably pushed away from
the grandiosity of the sin...
and it was done... in public... with...
a purview of... shaking established social norms!
it wasn't... a rabbit-hole of horror...

              which is why i'm glad i do not
have children of my own...
   i once spent an afternoon with...
my... grand-aunts son... my uncle...
don't ask...
         and i looked like him and thought...
well... i have most certainly had more
fun with cats and dogs...
i was a complete mute...
i didn't feel like cuddling this piece
of cubism... it looked human and even
contorted like one...
perhaps if it was mine...
i could have... somehow...
            "relegated my inhibitions"?
                 n'est ce pas?
         to have children and begin with...
that ******* of differentiating vowels from
consonants... and then... building consonants...
what... 5 vowels... 21 consonants...
5 x 21 = 105 variations...
       prefix: ab, ac, ad, af, ag...
                     eb, ec, ed, ef, eg...
                           IF only! oof!
                 the suffix - ba, ca, da, fa, go...
                                 bat cat dad fat god...
and then... the 21 x 21 consonant variables...
squared to the power of 5...
because... chinese is... frankly...
so simple...

   - it's summer and...
            since i would otherwise... require ink...
to write... and the paper would somehow
be always readily available...
no need for ink...
the summer months are terrible...
for no requirement of ink...
what is ink?  ink is...
                         i need october...
i need november... december... january...
february... half of march...
i need to borrow ink from the night!
i can't scribble in these arab / kenyan months...
these sun-seeker months
of idle by the dream-pool... load of...
overtly-talked... less thought...
therefore... no need to scribble...

    i need the night for my ink...
                           "punctuation marks are in
the constellations": oh yes... honey sweet...
what's it called? cliche? we've all been there...
i too would sacrifice Hector before the altar
of Achilles if i were Priam...
                   only because: he was called Hector...
and the other was Achilles...
and i was called Priam...
       in such times... what were...
the trully... common-place names...
of stunt-men and extras?
   i'd like to know the equivalent of a john smith
from ancient greece...
what would one call: him?
            
        perhaps: i tend to think about *** when
i... most probably had a dream...
jerking off is a bit like...
checking one's blood pressure...
or as a diabetic might... ***** his index
to check the sugar levels...
i write about "***" when i've had a dream...
the dream...

i was talking to a man about cars...
notably... cars from...
america and germany...
circa the years... 1920s through to...
                the 1970s...
          and... then... the talk of... a motorcycle...
a specific motorcycle...
   a triump street cup...
                 a BMW R18... but not quiet...
whatever it was...
                    for the love of a double-decker
bus and a pair of legs...
                which is not...
to have emotionally invested
in *** was something a much younger
version of me would have done...
i thank the prostitutes of curing me of this...
debilitating disease / dream...
              which, i, prescribed... myself...
so no... i hardly think...
there were any... mummy or daddy issues...
i would skip several scenarios:
as much as i love riding a double-decker
bus... i abhor... taking a taxi...
       even if it requires me to walk...
2 miles... i'd rather walk:
for the love of legs and... voodoo dolls hanging
like corks... bend the knee: they might say...
bullet to the knee-cap... if you ask me...
again...

     perhaps i wasn't born english...
but... after... 26 years among them...
                          it "sort of" grows on you...

- man can perform a thousand:
dodo project genocides in one sitting:
on the throne of thrones...
before jumping under a baptism:
fully attired in the ganjes pyjamas
in one sitting: on the throne of thrones...
to "squat" while *******...
*******... *******...
"scented candles" of taking a shower...

i write about *** every time i have a dream...
it's to succumb to the lesser...
escapade of me...
i can stomach subjectivity...
but having to stomach idealism...
is another matter: altogether...
i would like to worship the men who
have had their fill...
and settled for the swan blockade
of the widower romance...
the widow swan...
the black widow: a ******* spider...

none of it... i ****** good i ******
well... come the prime of the age 21...
she was a gamer side-kick bedded...
she prescribed me...
                        Bulgakov...
              reading a ****** to a prussian...
or reading a ****** to a RUŚ: example: ditto...
                  i have heard of how
love supposedly closed and opened borders...
we are so antithesis "different"...
we aren't... some western "communist"
zoo study:
the people who say and then...
lucky us paupers...
who have to "loot" the infrastructure
of the vacating ****-tunnels...
because... someone has to ****-off...
their tongue and... gerbil fidgety!

albino chimpanzee and...
boxer gorilla fed on...
the promise of bulk... with nothing
but... the promise of fruits of your
labour... and nothing relating
to protein... or fat... of complex sugars
known as bread... none of that!
still: that fudge-packing bulk of
gorilla bicep protein: amass!

   - as ever... the murk: before the deep-water...
the... inverted demigods
of h. p. lovecraft...
because... cthulhu is... "somehow"...
not the ******* son of Poseidon?

acid-quasi-monkey asks...
   placid-didgeridoo...
                a constipated: not funny...
attempts! at solving a crossword!
-frankenstein-myrhh:
                        ******* dangling...
                                    (-) - Fatima...
is this... "Syria" yet?
  concerning the second coming...
concerning...
Syrian civil war... something...
*******... miraculous...
has happened...
or was about to happen...
and that it didn't happen...
better that it did:
but since it... didn't...
best we cover it up...
                corpse bride:
               Khadija **** Khuwaylid...
if ever: Stephen Vizinczey...
was a (prophet) Muhammad...
in praise of older women...

    ...a Fatima... fleeing the Syrian
civil war... because... Ramses II
was... telling apart the 7 good years
from... the 7 ******* years...

tell you what... it's no fun...
when you've been given the need
to bend the knee before the altar
of phantom power...
if i were 16 and she was 14...
if i was 18 and she was 16...
if i was 60! and she was... 20!
would it matter?
               if i was jerking off aged 8...
you want to know...
what... the last prize is...
the last... difference between...
"consent" of two adult adult...
with their *******-riddle
of a theatre of ***?
     you want to know?
the thought of ******* someone...
under-age...
no! no barbie! no ken!
the theatre of thought...
of ******* someone... underage...
who is... displaying...
teasing ***... in that primodial seance
of grief to ward of mother from
the ******...
and father from the parentage of
school!

               you ever want to see...
what... a kick in the jaw looks like...
omnipresent onlooker...
of some... unpardonable crime...
that it has to be ***-related...
              i wish i performed some
unpardonable crime on a *******...
i guess a kiss is a kiss is an unpardonable
crime against a *******...
i need this heart to shelter itself
in stone! i need: a heart!
of hard-earned: rock!
               with each sentence:
i find it impossible to not....growl!
to howl! to spew a bickering of...
wolves... of hyenas...
a wake of crows!
            
              i want toi write an echo!
hye! anoooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
i want to hear...
the microscope itching
of a marrow...
of maggots working toward
a closure of expressing: scotch fudge!
i want! maggot marrow!
i want! the lost sounds of...
what the fox already minded...
in...                       χαoς! ρει(γ)νς!
yes... the gamma is a surd...
                 in this... english... equation...

last time i checked:
the cognitive theatre of the forbidden...
****** "lax"...
it's enough to tease the affair with
mere thought...
to have... people "bothered"
that one thinks... such "things"!
while the girl... prime... aged... 14...
teases you with...
exfoliations of...
                      script and... censure...
like a skirt...
but of course...
you're the dodo-project genocidal maniac
about to sport a new: cushioning
extreme...
of an ******* like...
you're minding teasing...
a high-blood pressure!

          can i allow myself a giggle?
a crown of: a dozen demons laughing
as relevant: to the 12 strong cohort of...
cognitive lapses of reason?
          
  ******* before a mirror is my...
my memory and my last concern for...
"adventure"...
a ****** ******* a russian girl so freely...
she fed off of us as...
     spinning a willow to confine itself to:
those rhubarbs in... "retro"...
no... i'm pretty sure... "they"...
the western communists would have minded
it coming across as...
  rhubarb... dreads... stiff 12" drizzle /
drool bits of a tight-knit white sporting ***!
my... oh... wait...
not exactly 16... so... no...

my... what?!
    this has to become one of those...
most... "unspectacularbly": "a least"
in what's to be digested... "fogiven"...
when... there's that teasing-**** of a per-se
readied for her rite of horror to be
met with ******* the...
upper... echelons...
to the queue! to the loiter!
to the...                cue: no dry martini equipped...
sort of... joke as... a variation
of... escapism: to excuse...
fixations... of social hierarchy...

    i am hardly a misogynist...
            it's almost... fake...
how feminists point out... death-pull...
the misogynists...
clinging to philanthropists... i suppose...
it's like...
"someone" forgot...
to... mention...
the benevolent in misanthrophy...
the happily allied to the ivory tower...
whether you're a man or a woman...
or a man pretending to be a woman...
or a woman pretending to be a man...

who is... the misanthrope?
            the solipsist...
the atheist: should you be god?
the altruist... the... fiddly-bit... extreme...
the... autist?
         who is... your... claim for...
******-****** ruleZ the world?
mother of all perfected children...
a bit like jerking off to...
those gravure beijing models...

ava lauren? she is... an aged looking
*******... closure: madame...
she earned it...
her skin is like leather...
you dare to: wear it...
   but... oops: the ubermensch...
these chinese "brides" are not...
photoshopped...
they're genetically edited...
it was apparent that china
didn't have a soul...
in its summa summarum...
or in its christ redeemer...
when... india has its rich
polytheism... pedagogy:
shiva the antithesis of vishnu:
the thesis...

    i can feel... at least!
i can feel abbreviated with the raj master...
sport...
sending a few "*******" to beijing!
let's hear a story...
no... i'm fuming mad:
i'm dying! to hear that coin-flip
of a tail: of bending the... fuckning knee:
capping... as one might!

there's a <100million of "me"...
there's... a >1billion of "them"...

   while:
            i ****** off to...
          genetically edited creatures...
the western world can hide
behind its setting sun: metaphor...
photo-editing... while...
the hot-**** beijing is...
gene-editing...
west-world 1972 bronze age:
"staging a coup"..

             yeah: gurran-gu-dag...
the arabs and their bangladeshi...
queen-bee sorted...
           elizabeth II...
royal ascot...
  i.e. lamborghinis raced on knightbridge...
because: arab playboys are to be...
minded...

write long... to ensure...
people read short... little chance
of censor-loved-up-pseudo-i.q.-heroes!
100 years later: you become a pseudo-Proust /
a Joyce... but... that also implies:
you're stiff up at the neck...
in death and sand... and worms...
in a grave! so? no turkish kebab:
no malmuk / no janissary resurrection!

THE FUN AT EASTER



i feel that easter is the best time of year,

you see we give eggs to all the kiddies

and we play easter egg finding games

and don’t forget Mr Chickadee will run right up

and catch 15 easter eggs and 27 chicken baskets

with a lot of syrup inside it

yeah, what about the chocolate

it is so tasty, as, i love it, you love it, we can all love it, woo

let’s party, let’s party, pop a few champagne corks

and when we finish we throw the bottle on the ground, glass shatters

and the people yell out a big ****

It’s hard to understand why do people eat chocolate at easter

i don’t understand why people suffer with weight gain at easter

i understand that easter is the most desirable time of the whole calendar year

hop hop goes the bunny

hop hop goes the bunny

yeah, mr bunny goes hop

hop hop goes the bunny

yeah mr bunny

the mighty bunny goes hop

you see there are so many people

who wish each other a very happy easter, *******

happy easter from the bunny

the bunny is extremely funny

ha ha ha, the mighty easter bunny is funny

It has been 268 days, 1 hour, and 27 minutes since you left the world Mel.

I felt you the other day,
As the leaves were changing their colors
I felt you the other day
Just like the trees feel the breath of winter upon their backs
and Fall inevitably turns to Winter
And the leaves disappear
And just like the leaves fall to the ground and get carried away
So do my memories of you
One at a time, I’m losing them
Since the day you died, fall has been in season
I had a tree full of brilliantly colored memories
And as time has passed on
The weather is having its way with my mind
No season lasts forever
And this one,
I wish it would
Because every day brings me another 1440 minutes
Away from your existence
I’m forgetting.
The first to go was your smell
So I held on tighter to every moment I spent with you
I wrote them all down, you know.
But my mind doesn’t understand how badly my heart needs to hold on
I’m forgetting
Your voice.
Your eyes.
Next it was your laugh
And all your little corks that I held so dear.
It’s been a while. Hasn’t it?

I felt you the other day
Without even thinking of you at all
I just knew you were there
Looking down at me
You know, sometimes I sit for hours
And focus solely on you and try to remember
And I torture myself
With the thought of you being gone
Until I feel a little bit of comfort,
And in that comfort, I know you are there
But as of late,
I don’t feel better
Sometimes I sit for hours and cry until I can’t see,
Until I can’t breathe,
Until I can’t speak
I have to.
Because if I don’t,
Then it makes me ashamed
I feel guilty
For forgetting to miss you.
I miss you everyday
It’s just sometimes, it hurts harder one day than it does the next

I felt you the other day
I felt your presence in mine
It was comforting
And shattering
I’ve learned that the wound never really heals
We just find a stronger medicine
I felt you the other day
As I sat in the red chair that people you didn’t know
Decided to dedicate to you
As an act of kindness so that we’d remember you
It’s been here for 218 days, and a little change
I’d like to burn it and pretend you never left
I’ve noticed that it’s easier to talk to you during the night-time
When I’m looking at the stars
Because it’s easier to remember when it’s darker
The sunlight just distracts me

I’ve breathed a million breaths since the day you left
Inhaled life and exhaled the stale air that somebody else
Will fill their lungs with
Yesterday is gone and tomorrow hasn’t happened yet and
I’ve spent today missing you
Today turns into yesterday
And tonight bleeds into tomorrow
And I’m still denying the truth
That you’re gone

Your voice will never reach my ears
Your heart will never pound upon your chest
Your breath will never pour into the atmosphere
And you've left us all here
and maybe we’re resentful cause none of us were ready
Goodbyes **** the passion out of you
Put your reality on pause while the world continues spinning
They take your breath from you
While reality drowns you and your lungs give out.
And you end up panting for breath
As you choke back the sobs that the world needs to hear

I sat next to your grave today
And the wind, made drunk with your presence,
Breathed against me
We talked, you and me
I talked
And you listened
I saw your mom
She told me that “you’re better off than we are”
And maybe you are
But it still makes me bitter
I’ve heard that nothing is destroyed,
everything is just transformed
So the trees are cut down and thrown in a fire
The logs are turned into ash
And blown away with the wind
Your shell is resting 6 feet below me
Flowers are growing
The grass has come back
You are in them
And that is eternity

And I hope you went
With a smile
I hope it was as easy and as quick as
Leaning back in a chair the color of the sun
while listening to lazy piano music
Can we reverse time?
Or has the timing been assigned?
Every moment has a purpose
Maybe death is misunderstood
Grief can cloud the mind
You roam free, no longer confined
Your destiny no longer follows a design
Wherever this journey took you
Don’t forget to paint the skyline
With your presence

It’s a little unfair and a little unclear
As to why you had to leave
How can life be so cruel?
It’s hard to believe
That moments turn to memories
And some memories turn to regrets
Regrets turn into lessons
And lessons paint vignettes
That become your background
Just a part of your past
We may be through with the past,
but the past is not through with us

Life changes and seasons go on
People pass away
Memories live on
Sceneries shift
Faces are interchanged
Life keeps on keeping on
And hearts get maimed
Human connections
Are all that truly remain
The fragile beats of the heart
Never stop when you’re in pain

Above clouds that hide the earth
from the stars: slowly the receding city
breaking up into plots, dotted around
patches of green and winding rivulets:
that distant fire slicing through mists
this winter morning like a lamp lighted
to the skies; Thoughts emerging from
receding memories, reversed numbers
of the tailgating truck's plate on my mirror
that misty morning, receding skyline
riding into the frost in many shades
of grey cast on the car speeding past;

Giant eye of the fair: the same phantasm
emerging, enlarging, dimming, receding;
Hall of dreams in a castle of darkness:
waves of events playing out again and
in smoke and shadows amid resounding
chambers, a costume and a drama, a role
you reprise again, dreamed of your past,
approaching and receding, breaking
everything, my heart; that wanton night;

The fair is up, one broken slipper of a pair,
half-buried cup, corks, shimmering
trinkets, withered roses, pecking birds,
circling again and again; that distant fire
dimmed into the clouds, all now smoken
moss-pale around; We take off now.
Welcome to your flight to never-land
this morning, we serve you breakfast
and hot tea. Inverted numbers playing
in my head, some approaching deadline.
Net, 10 I tell myself, enin, thgie...eno..eno..

What do you see when you're looking at me
a mass of contradictions?
a life on the tiles
all hidden by smiles
and twenty thousand miles to go


I never know when if I've been there and then
I'm not sure if I'm bothered
I'll go there again for the hell of it when
I get some motivation
or
I might stay in bed with a girl I once led
down
the garden path.

It is so very dark in the ark.
Forgive me Lord for I am afraid.
This lack of light has begun to burn
and I am suffocating, crushed

between pineapples and pigs.

Forty days and the flasks are all empty,
I drank every last drop of your blood.
Forgive me, for I was hungry and afraid.

Your Word was no longer enough.

Such stench and sway.
Such darkness, water and sick.
You promised me rainbows, white doves
and a rose bush when I die.

Bring pails and pliers, you said.
Gather corks, crayons, and screws.
Unwind the rhyme, you said.
Listen carefully: live.

But I am no sage.
I know nothing of verse,
even less of curses.

So I built it
and waited for wind.

You told me that I was your chosen.
That I was to carry the wine.
I believed you.

I should have eaten the pigs.
They're beginning to rot.

Fair insect! that, with threadlike legs spread out,
  And blood-extracting bill and filmy wing,
Does murmur, as thou slowly sail'st about,
  In pitiless ears full many a plaintive thing,
And tell how little our large veins should bleed,
Would we but yield them to thy bitter need.

Unwillingly, I own, and, what is worse,
  Full angrily men hearken to thy plaint;
Thou gettest many a brush, and many a curse,
  For saying thou art gaunt, and starved, and faint:
Even the old beggar, while he asks for food,
Would **** thee, hapless stranger, if he could.

I call thee stranger, for the town, I ween,
  Has not the honour of so proud a birth,--
Thou com'st from Jersey meadows, fresh and green,
  The offspring of the gods, though born on earth;
For Titan was thy sire, and fair was she,
The ocean nymph that nursed thy infancy.

Beneath the rushes was thy cradle swung,
  And when, at length, thy gauzy wings grew strong,
Abroad to gentle airs their folds were flung,
  Rose in the sky and bore thee soft along;
The south wind breathed to waft thee on thy way,
And danced and shone beneath the billowy bay.

Calm rose afar the city spires, and thence
  Came the deep murmur of its throng of men,
And as its grateful odours met thy sense,
  They seemed the perfumes of thy native fen.
Fair lay its crowded streets, and at the sight
Thy tiny song grew shriller with delight.

At length thy pinions fluttered in Broadway--
  Ah, there were fairy steps, and white necks kissed
By wanton airs, and eyes whose killing ray
  Shone through the snowy veils like stars through mist;
And fresh as morn, on many a cheek and chin,
Bloomed the bright blood through the transparent skin.

Sure these were sights to touch an anchorite!
  What! do I hear thy slender voice complain?
Thou wailest, when I talk of beauty's light,
  As if it brought the memory of pain:
Thou art a wayward being--well--come near,
And pour thy tale of sorrow in my ear.

What sayst thou--slanderer!--rouge makes thee sick?
  And China bloom at best is sorry food?
And Rowland's Kalydor, if laid on thick,
  Poisons the thirsty wretch that bores for blood?
Go! 'twas a just reward that met thy crime--
But shun the sacrilege another time.

That bloom was made to look at, not to touch;
  To worship, not approach, that radiant white;
And well might sudden vengeance light on such
  As dared, like thee, most impiously to bite.
Thou shouldst have gazed at distance and admired,
Murmured thy adoration and retired.

Thou'rt welcome to the town--but why come here
  To bleed a brother poet, gaunt like thee?
Alas! the little blood I have is dear,
  And thin will be the banquet drawn from me.
Look round--the pale-eyed sisters in my cell,
Thy old acquaintance, Song and Famine, dwell.

Try some plump alderman, and **** the blood
  Enriched by generous wine and costly meat;
On well-filled skins, sleek as thy native mud,
  Fix thy light pump and press thy freckled feet:
Go to the men for whom, in ocean's hall,
The oyster breeds, and the green turtle sprawls.

There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows
  To fill the swelling veins for thee, and now
The ruddy cheek and now the ruddier nose
  Shall tempt thee, as thou flittest round the brow;
And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings,
No angry hand shall rise to brush thy wings.

twisted words turn into twisted people
as they run around trying to seem well
and when they're twisting themselves more and more;
and when they unwind, slowly and vapidly,
they all start to hit the floor.

the bottle slid down to the floor so long ago,
but you were the only one who were to ever know
the reason i'd twisted the truth so much into a lie;
the reason i'd twisted what you saw, languidly,
through your twisted eyes.

as we all fell out in our fallout shelters
our twisted lives all, in an instant, began to welter
to the corkscrew sound waves coming out now;
to the corkscrews and corks lying about, sadly,
because we were all gonna die here, someway, somehow.

If love was blind,
we'd all stroll through life,
wearing rose tinted glasses,
faces worn from laughter lines.
We'd wear our hearts on our sleeves,
because there would be no need,
to keep barbed electric fences around
our fragile cores so they don't bleed.
There'd be a deficit of heartbreak,
No reason for our souls to ache
for the ugly monsters that rears their heads
as if it was the wrong decision to make.
Ignorance is bliss or so they say,
anger wouldn't seize control in the way
we lose our tempers like corks off champagne bottles
as love is blown away.
There would be no self destruct button,
we'd embrace the rancid parts of a person,
because what you can't see won't stain you
or strip love down to its origins leaving it rotten.
Yet I find love can be unconditional,
Battered,bruised and blunted
it can still flicker a flame in the embers
it defies all logical, an anomaly that's not rational.
When you feel this real tender love that is just kind,
whether its deserved there seems nothing that's enough,
to eradicate it's echo in the chambers of your heart.
A coin tossed wishful thought what if  love was blind...

Sunny Side Up

Don’t despair
The rain’ll clear
The storm’ll
Change it’s coarse

Sunny days
Are on the way
So unstop  
All the corks

Drink up life
With all your might
And don’t look
Back at you

You’ll never know
When you must go
So do all
You can do

By: Bill MacEachern

I want nothing more
Sea floors where we find the remnants of ancient merchants
Sunken while simply searching for profit
Soul entwined in sand and phosphorus
Body becoming whole with the glimpse of tomorrow
The marrow of my bones dwindling as light becomes food for my soul
I want nothing more that this
That I set my youthful mind on a distant star
And even time that ends will not keep me from reaching
Wine corks opened by delicate hands
Fingers that touch softly making me feel more
The warmth of my skin
The sound of my love in your beating heart
I want nothing more!
Nothing at all
Not a fistful of money and a palace to sleep in
Private jets and private islands
Where the air sings my name as I glide through her
And the sand on the beach wants me to lay beside her
I want nothing more
Than to be as beautiful as I am to you now
In my prime years of life, young, and eager hearted
Your visceral experience that taught me to dream
My dreams that spoke through the fog standing heavy in your soul
Your soul as a place my beauty alone reaches
I want
As simply said as the forgotten memories
The dead languages and foreign customs
The consumed today as garbage tomorrow
The son of the sun only rising knowing he will set
And be a glorious evening before all manner of darkness falls
I want only
That the beauty displayed by my face
In it's fresh form and grace
Is not
Could not
Would never be!
As beautiful to you
As my soul grown old
I want
That you will think me
As beautiful in my twilight
As I was
When I was young
That with each passing day
You love me more

I want

GOD THE DEVIL AND BOB at easter


today it’s good friday and bob delahunty was going to church to have a

hot cross bun feast, and a hungry poor buddhist was going into the church

and asked bob, why do the christians like to eat over easter, what is it all about

and bob said, it’s a time where families, forget about their differences and share

a big celebration, with hot cross buns today after their service and then on easter

they will host family get togethers, where the kids are forced to hunt for eggs

that the parents hid in the garden, it is a very good day, and the buddhist man said

why can’t christians be nice to each other every day, like us buddhists ands bob said,

well, i guess your right, but life hands us problems to fix, like divorce and family quarrels

and battles that can’t be resolved, you see we are always away from loved ones and easter

is a way to keep updated on where our loved ones are, and then the buddhist asked bob

why can’t they scype every night and then bob said, buddy, no person really wants to do that,

actually, it is great to give families fun at easter, like sending kids on easter hunts, how radical dude

and have great hot cross bun morning teas, where we all can feast, yeah, if we did these things every day

we would get so fat, and kids will be so greedy, and we need every city in the land to pop

open the champagne corks, saying HAPPY EASTER DUDES, AND TO ALL A HAPPY FEASTING

you see easter if you add an f, could mean, the annual feaster, but we took the f away to make you feel great

and then the buddhist said, ok but what if you were fasting in a remote country and you had to knock

back the hot cross buns and easter eggs and bob said ok, yeah, if your fasting you must say no, i am on a diet

and the buddhist said, what if you went to a nightclub and got heavily ******, from vodkas and rums etc etc

and get too drunk on easter saturday, are you still expected to roll up to family get togethers on easter sunday

and bob said yes, then the buddhist said, how do you cope, HOW THE **** DO YOU COPE

this is how, you sing

god is the devil and the devil is grog

god is the devil and the devil is grog

god is the devil and the devil is grog

especially round easter time where drinking may send you back and forwards to the sink spewing

and the buddhist asked bob one thing, before he went to tiabet, he asked, is there really such thing as a devil

because every night i drink a whole bottle of wine by myself and bob said, well if the devil was grog i think

i am the devil, cause, grog is my cup of tea

and the buddhist went home and bob left saying this one word, misbehave, everyone who drinks grog misbehaves

and there is nothing wrong with that, bob said happy easter and went back to the devil’s hideout and the buddhist blessed him

saying, the devil, there is no such thing

Fly you fool
People only get older
And poetry doesn't always need to rhyme
Life hands you lemons
But my tequila requires limes

What's the recipe for ice?
Can't see with 20/20 vision eyes
Fighting for a far off cause
And Santa Clause

Whatchamacallits
And compost heaps
Michigan to Denver
Face down in the mud
The baker helps me up
He's up at 2 AM
To hand out yesterdays left overs to the hobos and bums

Elliot Ness and Pat Garrett are on the trail
But The Iceman is watching patiently in his quiet suburb to emerge and bathe himself in their agony and his compensation

Hush puppies and truffle fries
Go-carts zooming through the race riots

Stomp
Tap
Snap
Clap
And sing along around the wishing well
Across the universe
Along the watchtower
With the brooding troubadour

The truth is ugly
Unless it sugarcoats itself with a false foundation and misleading mascara  

The burning bush spits out orders like ticker tape

I reckon its witchcraft
Either that
Or vertigo and dream piercing alarm clocks
Snooze

I AM VICE PRESIDENT AGNEW
Take it all away

The air is polluted with "love"
Or self-satisfaction disguised as love

More often than not
Almost always
I want you
Just you

I use geometry to calculate all these feelings
In summation, I'm insane but not as insane as you for loving me

Fractured my scaphoid
Now I'm paranoid of curbs and confrontation

I board the drunken ship
And circle Pangaea

We don't need a meteorologist to tell us the wind is with us, on our side
As we float on to the next one

My optometrist from Minnesota calls me and tells me my state of the art x-ray specs are in

I pulled something in my back, slipped a disk

Gentlemen, I take my leave  

I've been the liar
The actor
The martyr
The scribe
The one under the microscope hating every second
The one on the wanted poster

I can take your boos
I can guzzle your *****
Then clog your toilet
And walk away clean

Satan checks my blood pressure
Gives me ten milligrams of ****** and unleashes me upon the world

I burn the corks and crack the plates
I litter the empty bottles to leave them for the rest of you to recycle

Can you handle change?
Can you hold your own during the transformation?
This erratic evolution of the soul and person?

You've been in the honor society
Have you been inmate 107501?
Then what do you know?

You've been converted by the prizes in cereal boxes
Save the box tops and mail them in for an all expense paid trip to Crimea

Take this box cutter and do your worst

Your tongue licks away this candy shell of doubt that surrounds me
Until you reach the chewy center and free the surreal pleasure of sweetness

If all the corks from all the bottles of wine I’ve drunk
were to fall into my lap I’d promptly be buried
and likely suffocate.

If in their crates all the bottles of wine I’ve drunk
were to appear clean and unbroken
I could build a house.

If corks and bottles and crates were not lost to me
floor mat sea glass bricolage
I could scrape the sky.

Farewell, Santiago


The waves chortle in ripples; his boat
corks from side to side, slapping the surface
with a bone-bow and starving fingertips:
both have lost their names.  But he
gurgle-speaks to the gull and whispers
ancient lore along the foam-crackled crest.
He’s hooded and hunched,
an old scalawag that never found home
anywhere that didn’t drift like him.
Sand doesn’t speak his language anymore.

But the interwoven arms of corals
can tell stories by the North Star,
times when he was agile and supple;
knee-deep in seaweed and the salt-burbled edge.
The night he slit his palm with a pocket knife
and offered life bounty to the tides
in brotherhood; one drop in,
many drops out over the years

and frayed nets, unfurled ropes.
The redemption of hope glistened in cobalt scales
and weighed at market like poison vials,
polluted inky clouds tarnishing
every coin—hardly worth the bloodletting.
Not anymore.
Dusk fans out orchid and orange blaze;
he yawns a welcome to the mako at last.

I've been looking down the bottle for so long my eyes are corks
When I'm drinking liquid bread there isn't a need for forks
The only reason I'm here is because my father shot the stork
And my mother was wearing that white dress like it was her corpse
And their love sounded more like morse
Constant disconnect, hoarse

Things get a little ****** when you're having sangria dreams
When you're void of love, and you're falling asleep on mail you never opened, and bills you've got to pay, and pills you never want to take
And a pile full of your mistakes

You brush off, you shave, you work
Or you don't, and you sit in bed all day with guilty insides
And you open up another bottle of wine
And you think about love, mishaps and ***
But this time it doesn't hurt
Till that bottle of wine convinces you the pain is a flirt

Waking up in mid morning.
Waiting for your beautiful words to cross my brain waves.
Wondering when I might be graced by your heart racing presents.
As the day goes by I think of you and smile.
I give my dearest to you.
I wait and watch the world pass me by and I wonder are you another passer by,
the man in the mask,
a looker,
a watcher
as well I surely don't know.
Nothing seems to matter in our world everything just floats around as we embrace.
At night I wonder if we'll spend nights together in the future.
Will you be my past and present
I won't ask for future I'll leave that with you.
I feel as if all my little corks and silly fears will never bother you
as if I could be perfect.
Beautiful to you plain to others.
I can wait forever to spend open time with you as long as it takes.
I'll sit on your corner. I always imagine my future not with others in it until you.
I could never hate you.
Love is all I have.
I stay awake dreaming of us.

Waking up in mid morning.

Your friends' new place is by the Red River;
You notice the wood signs hung on their wall:
Stencils with the first letters of their names
comprised of corks from bottles they emptied
and another--"Pasta and wine, good times".
When they talk, it’s about
parties with beer, wine, and ***** spilling
out of cups, down dresses onto the floor;
recalls of day-drinking
and smoking cigars on the balcony
in college and oh, just last-night’s partying
yes, at Jason’s wedding
reception in the Ramada ballroom.
Don’t forget the leprechaun loop of bars
downtown on St. Patrick’s.
or the party buses that bring you there;
the first stop will have a schooner waiting  
with Long Island iced tea.
This talk of drinking makes you all hungry,
at Barbacoa you order tacos
and margaritas.
and think of ordering another round.
Another day, you drink pink lemonade
at Olive Garden and ask, How would it
taste in a cocktail?
At work, coworkers laugh off a hard day
and someone says, “I need a drink.”
And someone adds, “We all need drinks.”
At the bonfire on Saturday night,
someone laughs about the campus’s bikes
being thrown and found in the Elm Coulee
and another adds, “We like to drink here.”
Someone says, “That’s why I have a big cup.”
Who needs a bike anyway? They have cars.
Some of your friends drinking are driving home.
When the cup passes to you, you sip some.
The fire flickers and blows smoke that flies
into the wind over the rest of town,
over a river that can’t quench its thirst.

My concoctions is dangerous.
They have no labels.
I cannot find the right words to sprawl on them
so people will understand.
The mixes are too complex.
The feelings
too real.
I bottle them up with corks and stack them high on a shelf where no one can reach,
but the shelf collapsed.
My jars shatter and everything is blended together again.
But this time I cannot separate them.
The mixture created a fog so thick that even I cannot see.
My sight is blurred, but glasses will not help this time.
It has gotten so bad that now whatever direction I travel in doesn't matter because
somehow the fog is everywhere.

Friends, family, everyone seems to be shouting my name, trying to lead me in the right direction.
But I can't find where they are standing.
It is impossible for me to reach them now;
I am too lost.
The shouts I used to hear have turned whispers,
and the whispers
faded
to
black.
I know they didn't stop calling for me,
but my ears stopped working.
I gave up on myself.
But it is my
mistake.

I forgot to label the bottles TOXIC.
I didn't know the damage this could cause.
How badly the solution I made would burn.
But It does not affect the flesh; instead it crawls inside and rips at the heart.
Swallows it whole.
And the red.
It drips everywhere,
covering everything,
both
inside
and
out.
And as it eats at me, it spreads to everyone around me.
The pain is too strong.
I used to be able to make it go away,
but not anymore.

I stopped walking a while ago.
Now I lay here.
No one will find me
but I gave up hope a long time ago.
The only thing that is with me is
my dark passenger,
but it is hardly comforting.
It used to be in one ear, when I could still hear the shouting in the other.
But now the passenger surrounds me.
And just like the fog,
it consumes me
whole.

All the bills were coming in
I've paid off all of them
There's credit on the plastic
I'm free-wheelin' again

Work is done and over
We are with our friends
Corks have popped, it's Friday night
We're free-wheelin' again

Winter's been a long one
Like it would never end
Soon the bikes are coming out
We'll be free-wheelin' again

I saw you today mingling and chatting up
Girls while I cleaned glasses behind the bar
All blond hair and half smile and laughing eyes
And a part of me wanted to
Take your words apart and mold them into
corks for my white-wine bottles so that if
Some pretentious soul sighed “the pinot please”
Then the ***** in my hands could pierce through
All your lies and insincerity but
there were too many people between us
And I guess you never meant much to me
Anyways

You:
Text book Manic Pixie Dreamgirl, all blonde hair, blue eyes, and have you heard this song yet?
You call blood pomegranate sludge, and tattoo your toes with safety pins and spoiled ink.
Your freckles are corks, we understand, and your pain outweighs your grief.
You once found solace at the bottom of a bottle, now it lies crumpled in a lover's hand.
Bad kids! We were, but never bad enough for you.
Not twenty-five miles per hour, beer in hand, the sun is setting, we might not last till morning, but we'll go on driving anyway, bad.
You are cross-country dazzling, where-will-she-go-next? Paint brush lusting, vintage sweater.
You have spark plugs in your ears.

An announcement, dear spoons, it has come to my attention,
That knives are in fact the superior invention,
They cut and they dice, and they bring us sliced bread,
While for spoons, I'm afraid there's not much to be said,
They're good for the stirring and sipping of soup,
They can help you eat anything; well, as long as its goop,
They can't even manage to show a proper reflection,
Try gazing at one, it upends your direction,
Oh spoons, you buffoons, you round-bellied fools,
Try slicing, not scooping, you inelegant tools,
Knives dress to ****, while you spoons are such slouches,
And knives are quite charming; you lot are all grouches,
It's clear that knives are the superior race,
They'll put you dumb spoons back into your place,
At the bottom of the drawer, way down with the forks,
Alongside the can opener, and a screwer of corks,
You're the **** of the table, I despise your skullduggery,
That's why I declare knives the finest of cutlery.

The hypnotic affecting extremism at its apogee paused to smoke a
cigarette while the fulcrum groaned as the smoke gave warning that
the night  ended and the long day ahead was about to begin; as it
began hurtling downward, flicking the still glowing **** aside, like
so many grim-faced hotel rooms, oddly black and white in a world
that can only imagine rainbows, it’s message gaining momentum
while opposing forces, raging at the loss of its friction on the public
consciousness, braced itself as its stomach churned because the
bottom had fallen out of its idealistic pilgrimage; the survival of
good conversation, a flowing flute, bottled wine with old corks
never seemed to concern itself with the lack of compromise; it
was only the death of pay phones and taxis, like a miscarriage,
creating momentary pause, that remembered what it was like to
once matter only to be abandoned because life is only about how
arrogance, no matter its source, vicarious or self-induced, a tooth-
pick in its mouth, unimpressed because cynicism held tightly to
the rope, swinging it, not out of convenience, but because it
enjoys toying with outrage, unsentimental, bored with itself and
in need of a ticket for the show; while a poet looked on, consumed
with right and wrong; whether to be a pacifist or a realist, to be
patriotic or humanistic no matter nationality, to be the writer
or the book, to accept that evil must be vanquished or to merely
lament the human condition; he knew the love of beautiful words
meant nothing to a world on fire; to a hit man trying to finish
what he first shot was unable; to a poor man sleeping under the
thin blanket of speeches and promises; to a child, terrified by
blinding light and deafening explosions; only the mindless
idealist could love these words, yet was it truth or was it only
a selfishly clever principle that pointed in one direction no
matter yesterday’s accusations that became todays justification;
would it be that he cast aside contemplation for his own gun;
to become the killer or the hand that turns off the sound of the
montone ekg, so that the world might not be aware of the
necessary evil of killing evil; but what would truth say as the
pendulum races past prudence, towards an equilibrium not
in balance with virtue but instead with revenge and opportunism;
what should he say about that; who would listen to his blood
stained pen, witness of his own atrocities, killing his own
voice, once full of peaceful assurance about the good within
the hearts of men; who would listen to the shrugging shoulders
of a rebuilt poem, to be told to children and those who wish
to think of the things that powerful men destroy as history
has always insisted must be so; who would listen to the naïve
man who had a way of arranging emotions at will; who would
listen as another hypnotically extreme apogee lit another cold
hearted cigarette, without a filter, because what would be the
point of that; there was none; decency could not survive hell
and its lungs could not survive the slow death anyway;  it
became a matter of feeling the fire from the inside, so that the
words meant something to somebody because they would
know that a life of pain was the only way to reach the point
of meaning; a sort of constant face full of inspiration as he
took his seat next to the fulcrum that remained alone, unable
to speak because nobody cared to listen or reason anymore;
it didn’t seem to matter; only that beautiful words had to live
live for itself and for those who wanted to feel that way for
a moment; but he knew, that lies and compromises lived
silently, because flowers do not grow in desert sand and a
poet who closes his eyes is like a baby with a rattle in its hand