Moist and monochrome, clouds are gathering
On a Sunday afternoon.
Look up idly from my browsing, at the building 'cross the pool
Winds picks up, the monsoon breezes
Lick at the curtains twelve floors up
On the terrace, woman standing
Arms outstretched, grasp the rail
Legs stressed back, footloose in sandal
Lightly muscled, slightly formed
Kimono slips from lighted shoulder, designer ****** strawberry brown
Fabric glides across the hip-line
Revealing all to me below
Wearing nothing on the landing
Hint of shadow, ***** mound.
From the sliding doors behind her
Steps a man not quite unseen
Waist encircled in one movement, undergarment stripped away
Rigid stillness then the thrusting
Tension mounting at the breath
Woman gasps the O shape forming
Through her silent, varnished lips
Mahler moaning on the ITunes
Waves are forming, silent sound
Thrusting, busting, flexing, ******* arching back crescendo reached
Sun comes out, just at that moment
Roads diverging in the wood
Disconnecting, and uncoupling
Might and maybe should and aught
Trembling fingers, taught in temper
Blink the eye and pop the top
Shaking hands that hold the taper, to the unformed smoking spliff
**** the wreaths in, breathe the thought out
Bottle clinks across the teeth
Unbelieving, unconcealing
Unrelieving, unreleased
Jan 10, 2013
Jan 10, 2013 at 4:38 AM UTC
A generation ago in the hope of redemption
I would look into the mirror, and shave through the steam
Reflected in dim disapproval I'd see
Half the face of my father, the contempt that is me
Looking back in the hope of connection.
He's now younger than I am, since he died before time
And I no longer feel cowed at the tone in his voice
But this morning reach up to the root of the deed
Expressed in a context, and now finally succeed
To move through past the bones of dejection.
I straighten my shoulders and grin to the past
**** in my stomach, raise my arms in the air
Breathe deeply and uncouple a loud cry to the air
A little in sorrow, really not in despair
And draw back from the arms of the boatman
Nov 27, 2012
Nov 27, 2012 at 5:28 AM UTC
There's a girl I think about, sometimes
On wet afternoons, and when I'm on my own
Well, she's an older woman now but still a first affection
With a family, grown to middle age
And a dead husband in her past, somewhere.
We knew each other forty years ago, perhaps
In an army town; or was it slightly later?
We were never intimately joined
In those prophylactic, pre-pill times
And the frowning fathers, narrow-eyed on the fringes
She could drive, and had her mothers car that day
We slunk out to a field, to dispose of her virginity
But, the military fuzz they quickly found us
And took us in to the local station
Heart thumping, testosterone levels tumbling
That was the last time that we met, I think.
We corresponded fitfully, and for a short time after
But somehow shame and not a little guilt
At what I'd done and left undone, sputtered the phrases and
Quite soon the letters stopped arriving.
Unconsummated but never quite forgotten, last week
A Facebook message in my in-box, unbidden
From a name unfamiliar to me, and suspicious
"Dear Sir" it read, and proceeded to announce itself
Auspicious, as my former lovers son.
Can this be you? the lovers son enquired politely
My mothers friend that we talked about at Christmas?
Triumphant, there mother! I have found him
Far across the years and using now's technology
Across a lifetime of separateness
I sensed in her a broad reluctance, despite the introduction
From her child, who's person never was a factor
To connect with me again, this different person
Risking the diminution of that dimmed image, the remnant
Of who we had been that time
And why not? Why confuse the layers and the generations?
The forewarned spectacle of our sad reunion
Uncomfortably eye-ing each other with little left in common
Awkward unsaid phrases hanging out to dry
In the flag-fluttering breezes of our allusions.
But, in fact, there had been another reason I admit
For shame that final hour that final day
When I had been revealed in all my nakedness as wanting
Tongue tied and mumbling my excuses to the sky
Youth I was, weak, poor and unconvincing
The police were brusque and thoroughly impersonal
Growled deep-throated at my love and I.
And I; I discarded my affection for security and left her there
Disconsolate and disbelieving in the police station
More worried about the facing of my father
And so we left it then last week with little left unsaid
Knowing both it was too late and too unknown
For reintroductions as the people we had been
Unconvincing in our bright and sharpened protestations
Preferring poor relations in a foreign country
Nov 26, 2012
Nov 26, 2012 at 5:22 AM UTC
Separation kills
My desire for anyone else
Other than you, love.
Nov 26, 2012
Nov 26, 2012 at 5:03 AM UTC
Is this it? This spring?
May I have more time please?
Sorry mate, that's all.
Nov 8, 2012
Nov 8, 2012 at 9:08 PM UTC
Ina's pregnant, I am bored
Grace and Eric mute behind me
On the street two floors below us
Standing water, hissing tyres.
Two more hours of this, I'm thankful.
Endless meetings, glassy eyes
Homeward bound on lighted transport
Rain-streaked windows, dark outside.
Weekend coming, confused feelings
Clean the flat and iron the shirts
Talk to no-one, poolside vigil
TV meal and early night.
Is this it? The final curtain
Did I know this at that time?
Regardless of the closing sentence
No repeating, only rhyme.
Nov 8, 2012
Nov 8, 2012 at 4:03 AM UTC
(This poem was discovered etched/burnt into the interior woodwork of a viking ship of around 800AD, discovered in the north of England in the '60s. Quite possibly from the northernmost islands around the area now referred to as Archangel, and originally written in what became known as Runic/Russo Scandinavian, it nevertheless resonates clear Saxon/German tonality. Given that it is one of the first examples of early Runic, and indeed that the actual letter-shapes are unclear, the poem has been reproduced below, using broad phonetic license.
As far as can be determined, the content appears to be a somewhat ribald message from the ships leader to his wife. It was not uncommon for women/wives to accompany their men folk on long voyages. Given cramped conditions aboard, the conditions were likely to be insanitary and it is this condition that informs the subject). WJL
Das andrs zu-almen su-cara
Archezum des hafta confagra
Der ecra zu alpe
En pecra nachte schalpe
Viel ondra der zulpa te bag-ra
Und zortem pur ordour cloabera
Eh-min-te ah solbra schactarar
Sul-phereth zum tinctum
Abroath ah den penk-tum
Bai anthe con anthe ebactah-ra
Zorbuhr genkst canke zer vilk-um
Solginster zep ecra der nep-ehlcome
Calmen-de ser paarte
Eh zin bah die faarte
Confide ah can-de zum schtinc-tulm
Nov 5, 2012
Nov 5, 2012 at 5:23 AM UTC