”NON SO COME..SI PUÒ VIVERE IN QUESTO FUOCO?

after
the war
we returned

ourselves
(but not)
our selves

to Our Country
right
or wrong

that was
like a life sized
replica of what

we had left
only alien
to us now

we were guilty
(guilty as hell)
of surviving

this hell
that made ghosts
of so many

& we these
ghosts
of flesh and blood

haunting
the living
envious of them

and their ability
to forget
by remembering

we hoarded
our tears
we couldn't cry

went on living
because...because
we didn't know how

to die
each moment a battle
we could never win

*

"I do not know how it is possible. . .to live in such fire."
Dante

IN THE MYTHOLOGY OF FOXES

the foxes blood
on the stone
still there

two days
after
staring at me

only
the day before
a daring raider of

my uncle's henhouse
the talk
of our household

but my uncle
was patient
& stalked the lonely hours

until the fox
came to meet her death
thinking only of her cubs

& how big & bright
the moon loomed
tonight

and how
the fearful thunder
of the gun

had ended
everything
and how now

shot through the head
her carcass thrown
behind a hedge

she finds herself
still staring back
into the mind

of the little boy
even more aware
of her presence

now that nothing
exists
and how for

ever after
the boy
carries her death

cradling it
in his mind
trying to

comfort her
with his human
tears

TEA & GHOST

usually I
never leave home
without it

but(I don’t know why)
today
(it just slipped my mind)

and I left home
without my body I
didn’t even take my shadow

I just floated
free
free of me

enjoyed being
whatever
I encountered

...a stone...sea...cloud...
...a me
that wasn’t me...

rain...or just
the falling of rain
but then came full circle

& ran into
my  “me”
again

I had being enjoying
being rain
just falling...falling

but then my ghost
grabbed hold of me
and put me back

in my dream
and I awoke
to find myself

only me again
it was
very disappointing

I got up & made
some tea & toast
chatted with my ghost

who quoted
William Blake
to me:

“Body, is a portion
of the soul
discern’d by the 5 senses.”

I sat there
& chewed it over
“Yeah, I guess...?"

then I grabbed
my hat and coat
and went to work

SKIN & BLISTER

we grin & grimace
drop candle wax
onto our fingertips

as the storm
rattles our window pane
angry that we won’t let it in

All night
it rages
toppling chimney

pots with a crash
smashing slates
it strips from rooftops

as we safe
giggle & peel off
our waxen fingerprints

hold them
(tiny whirlpools)
in our palms

those whorls
of self
unique to each

I wearing my sister’s
fingerprints
she... wearing mine

*

SKIN & BLISTER is Cockney rhyming slang for sister. We were so close we could have worn each other fingerprints and as a little boy I was delighted to do so. I was her and me was she. This I guess is something we did to amuse ourselves before...telly arrived.

TINY CLINGING CURLS

I remember you
looking almost
Audrey Hepburn-ish

my big sister
& oh...
that smile

touching my world
with the wonder
of your love

we are Christmas-ing
the place
living in the candle's glow

love
nothing but love
in almost slow motion

the holly bites
your little finger
I **** the drop of blood

that grows
& grows
until it is kissed better

you laugh
'Ah...my little
saviour! '

and sigh
with an almost
mock Victorian swoon

tiny curls cling
to the nape of your neck
like the tiniest of tiny seahorses     

we swim
in the sea
of our laughter

the next Christmas
you were dead
lost to this

world
leaving me alone
to mourn you

I...
unable to
save you

now...all these years
later
(years you never knew)      

the holly
bites my little finger
& I **** it quickly

tasting through
my tears
the sweet tang

of your blood
still so alive
in my mouth

"DO YOU HAVE A QUESTION?"

her heart was a red
fire alarm
going off with nobody

paying it
no mind
at all

her heart was
an evening hillside
as the sun went down

the light
stealing
into the ground

her heart was a favourite
pair of cufflinks
with one link missing

or an earring found far
too late many many
years later

her heart was a lute
that was mute
un-played for

many
many
moons

her heart
was a house
burningburningburning

down
razed
to the ground

the sneer of her
pyromaniac lover
lost in the shadows

her heart was
the junk mail
that came in one door &

out the other
instant
*******

she felt as if
someone had
pressed DELETE

her heart was
a crystal ball
that could foretell

nothing....
nothing
at all

her heart was
a knocked over
cheap cocktail

that left a nasty stain
on the carpet...
on the wall

her heart was
a tiny torn pink knapsack
that held all she had known

her heart was
the forgotten
iron

branding itself into
her nice new
blouse

her heart was
a field of poppies
seen

from a passing train
there&gone
again

her heart
full of the perfume
of memories

that refused
to ever
...go away

her heart was
the same train journeying
in and out of...love

*

Memory is seen( and felt )as a perfume...in its there and not-there-ness whereas the poppies are a splash of red glimpsed from a passing train.as she is overwhelmed by her senses falling falling...in and out of love. It's a bit of an emotional rollercoaster ride with what her heart was experiencing as she tried to put into words feelings that could not be...put into words

The poem issues forth from Rimbaud's commands to the energy of the time...." Le Poète vous dit: 'O lâches. soyez fous!' " to " Le Poète te dit: 'Splendide ta Beauté' "

The Poet says to you: "O cowards, be mad!" to The Poet says to you; "Your beauty is marvellous!"

END OF SUMMER

once
with astonishment
I stole

a butterfly
from the end
of summer

I only meant
to borrow her
admire her

the miracle of her
smeared clumsily
across my child's hand

so that I could not
return her
to what little was left

of summer
leaving a jagged hole
in the time of the sky

where she
should have
been

a box
empty of its matches
served as a makeshift

coffin
matches stuck in
fresh earth

like little red-headed
flowers
blazing all at once

her funeral pyre
often I steal
back to that moment

cut out of summer
the empty place she left
in me

seeing clearly
the butterfly shape
cut awkwardly

out of time
jagged
at the edges

my mind seeing beyond
into the infinity
of death

hoping
her ghost
can forgive me


*
I then tried to give her the kiss of life and ended up swallowing her...which is another story...another poem!


BETWEEN THE SPACE

When I was small
I wanted - a pet.

My mother didn't
- like pets.

'It followed me home! '
'Can I...keep it...can I...can..! '

didn't work
& I invariably had to
return the kidnapped cat
to the house I had
'borrowed' him from.

Between the space

where my mother wrung screaming wet clothesthrough the rollers
and out the other side to quite flatness

and the coal bunker
where a briquette wire spat at me
almost nearly blinding my left eye

I captured a Cabbage White
hiding amongst the coal.

Emptying the strawberry jam with the gollywog on

I gave her a world of glass
where she danced to the sunlight's mad music.

Neither she nor I
understanding the nature of glass

her dancing grew frantic
my love stifling.

I not knowing
all things
must breathe

the dancing died to a sudden stop.

Being an impressionable child
and after only seeing a life safety film

I dived through the panic
and swam madly against the guilt

took her gently
into my trembling

fingers...her dusty colour
taking my fingerprints

I tried to give her
the kiss of life

choked with grief
and swallowed her

terror in my mind
butterfly in my tummy

and fear running
blind and crazy

that I could not
give her

her dancing
back again.

I said nothing
for years

(about the incident)  

until I could explain
myself to myself

and my self

...understood.