We all lie to a beggar
When asked if we have some to spare
If we did not have to spare
Then we too would be beggars

'And am I then a pyramid?' says Senlin,
'In which are caves and coffins, where lies hidden
Some old and mocking hieroglyph of flesh?
Or am I rather the moonlight, spreading subtly
Above those stones and times?
Or the green blade of grass that bravely grows
Between to massive boulders of black basalt
Year after year, and fades and blows?
Senlin, sitting before us in the lamplight,
Laughs, and lights his pipe. The yellow flame
Minutely flares in his eyes, minutely dwindles.
Does a blade of grass have Senlin for a name?
Yet we would say that we have seen him somewhere,
A tiny spear of green beneath the blue,
Playing his destiny in a sun-warmed crevice
With the gigantic fates of frost and dew.
Does a spider come and spin his gossamer ladder
Rung by silver rung,
Chaining it fast to Senlin? Its faint shadow
Flung, waveringly, where his is flung?
Does a raindrop dazzle starlike down his length
Trying his futile strength?
A snowflake startle him? The stars defeat him?
Through aeons of dusk have birds above him sung?
Time is a wind, says Senlin; time, like music,
Blows over us its mournful beauty, passes,
And leaves behind a shadowy reflection,--
A helpless gesture of mist above the grasses.

step one:
do not look at their mouth,
for you will expect to see rivers flowing from it,
poetry slipping through the space between their lips
in the same way that the wind slips through the space underneath a door,
but instead you will only see spit and saliva
and a tongue too big for its home.

step two:
do not look at their hands,
for you will expect them to craft cities from marble right before your very eyes,
but instead it will be just the thumbs,
the twiddling of thumbs,
the aimlessness, the senselessness,
the lack of experience with building empires.

step three:
do not look at their eyes,
for they say that the eyes are the windows to the soul,
and when you see that the curtains have been drawn,
you will feel so very alone.

step four:
i did not love you.
you have to repeat it.
i did not love you.
i did not love you.
i did not love you;
i loved what i thought you would be.
i thought you would be eden,
but you were only the apple.

step five:
i suppose i am to blame here
for digging holes too big to fill,
for crafting shoes too big to fit in.
and for that i am sorry.
i am sorry that i expected more from you
than i even expect from myself.

step six:
human.
human.
let the word roll off and around your tongue,
let it cover every inch of the inside of your mouth.
say it. over and over again.
say it. like it is foreign and you need to know what it means.
say it.
and when you have said it enough times and it feels
dull, old,
disappointing,
you will know that we are nothing more than flesh and bone,
and that as much as we wish there were gods among us,
flesh always rots in the end.
this is the beast of truth that we cannot outrun.
hands cannot craft cities from marble
if only given clay.

step seven:**
do not let this frighten you.
clay, after all,
was meant for molding.

(a.m.)

If you're ever on the riverside
where the sun beats your head
you would see the old man
selling hats of palm leaf
but you care not to notice him
having already smelled the sea
and too keen to cross the river
travel southward on the island
till the saline wind scalds your eyes
your skins itch to jump into the waves
yet the man with the palm leaf hats
would not cease to tell you
how burning would be the sun on the sands
and so badly you need to protect the head
by parting bucks that mean nothing to you
but a world to the mouths he feeds
and before you stamp on him a final no
she has one atop her hair
beneath which her eyes flutter like butterflies
her sun rouged cheeks untimely blush
and two born anew lovers
merrily head for the sea
having bought romance
for forty bucks.

i'm sick to death of this stinking routine
perpetual day time TV,
petty bickering
afternoon pub binges
hopeless job hunting morons everywhere,
i return to my hometown
to the place i was made, molded
created
and it suffocates me like never before
i think of the many reasons i left
they circle my thoughts for a long while
and then i'm left with one
one that overrides the lot
it takes a while to spit it out
because it's corny, it's stupid, it's not how we work
but
it's love
and the lack of it
the love here is in the mundane
the easy,
the norm.
it's not in the heart
the love around here lies in
television sets
and pirate DVDs
reduced chicken and new coffee machines
gambles on abused horses
saturday afternoons in the local
cheap holidays to Benidorm
a day trip to lidl
a weekday evening watching the soaps
a phonecall to a family member you don't care about
hours playing candy crush
the love has lost on us humans
the love here, it was lost on me too
it missed me out
they missed me out
it has instead transferred in this
reality tv, selfie indulgent zeitgeist
it has left our silly bodies
and i'm still clinging on
trying to dissapear from that
new century bubble
trying to pick up pieces
of that porcelain mosaic
that old style bric a brac
so long ago forgotten
pressure is everywhere
notifications beep
this tiny block of perspex
waiting to be touched
waiting to be in communication
with someone at the other side of the city
the other side of the world
oh what a sad existence
when all we love is through the inanimate
and not ourselves
but hey thats the way of the world
and we have to accept it
or hate it
because we can't do both
we have to accept our fast paced tumultuous society
always moving through space and time
at times, difficult
painful
hard
sore
but consumerism, capitalism and cronyism
it all exists in this big society
this 'we're all in it together' society
and it cant be ignored.

If I could swallow my words
And take anything I've said
Back into my veins;
Like they never existed,
Out of all the memories
I've rewound in my head
I'd never take back a single word
But maybe would have just kissed you
Instead