Sandwiched in layers of liquid crystal display,
Encased in vats of plastic,
                          
                            we
Voyaging in data-spheres, plumes of digital play.

Mindless,
         In the soup of silicone,
                            
                            all
Myt­h-makers,
         Pouring over electro-spawned
         networks,
                            
                            fall
Workers,
          In the buzz of bits and bytes, of
          megabytes and terabytes,
                            
                            down
Everyone
          Far from the wood, the brine, the
          mud that caked us,
          In tighter and tighter
          digitised  projections,
                            
                            click!
‘Like me’,
‘Share me’,
‘Leave your comments.’

Messages smoothed out in polymers,
Beyond reproductions of ourselves,

                           enter:

Deeper, delving in the mire of dream-conscious,

Now a waking voice,
          Hardened, digitised, recorded in
          bubbles, in drives, in clouds:
                        
Numb numbers of numbers numb,
                          mirror.

          A platform slotted home:
The motherboard!
          To record the echo in the hollow
          of our Being.

I awoke
with mountains in their heights
that spoke
of memories that wove
through knees
thighs
and ***** bone --
to the inky waters of the lake below.

In that cabin
where the sable pines enclose
and all about
from coral-white
to grayish
turquoise-blue
snow.

That scene:
on the edge
where the stillness
Knows.

In pubs with bar flies.
Kronenburg, Becks, Carling, Stella Artois and Fosters,
Dancing in our blood,
Utterly inured; we are endured by all:
The solipsism most profound.

And when Johnnie, Jack and Jameson join,
The sentimental and the morbid
Are conjoined.

And ****!
In the custody of beer halls,
The shadows that draw, fade,
And calls – e’en Death’s! -- are put on hold!
No time; instead, before the last, another pint.

For in this hallowed inn,
Drinking what’s in the glass,
And espousing the glow within,
Cares regress.

No woes,
Or loaded psyches,
For when the pressure builds,
The best: a jet of yellow bliss,
Relieves the pain,
On Armitage Shanks' porcelain.