A spiralling ascent
Along the world's edge
Sweatdrops fall
To a below without sunlight
Boot dust
Llamas labour under supply packs
Hoof beat lantern dance
Shadows cast on the cliff face
Distorted we loom
Above the mute fog of humanity
Summitous
Awash in the final dawn
The old Inca smiling sprouts his knife
Ancient tapestral landscape
Exhales into us
Curvously infolding
The old Inca holds out his hands
The knife cuts horizontally
Reality opens like a book upon a tabletop
There, he says,
Pointing to the infinite space between where the sky in the past met the land
Timespace lies like a discarded washcloth
And we see dimly through the mists—
There, he says,
Pizarro could not follow us,
And we see dimly through the mists—
The neon lights of
Neoqusqo

The mountain grows much slower than your perception of the mountain growing taller, as the dynamics of the sea, which sculpts the earth beneath your feet, speaks—summoning the breeze: isn't it surreal, living on God's pottery wheel?

Amid the rubble
Of four dim millennia peeled back
A square of carved steatite lay
Lifted
Gently as a gossamer hope
To reveal
That mythic beast
A single horn curving
From its striated head
Whose fame reached Grecian ears
From Indus bed
Across miles & years
Leaving an inkmark murmur

The swirls of heavy scented dew drops,
Danced and played, revering down the glass panes.
Echoing the emeralds, of etched ecstasy,
Flashed in blossoming British gardens.

It was early morning,
The newspaper yet to be delivered,
But late enough that the milk bottles stood, organised,
Shoulder to shoulder in a 2x2 formation of solidarity.

A blood orange tinge burned the sky,
Between the spital dashes of grey clouds,
the blackbird soared and sang,
and oh how it found sanctuary amongst the buckthorn brush

can you hear the awful drums?
they're telling us that things will never
         ever be the same again -
so they beat, the exact same rhythm
as the blood clogging my ears.

let's take the method
right out the madness, shall we?
          laughter won't feel half as good
          once the last bit of wine has left my throat;
the sacred chalice shattered long ago.

a tall man comes my way, hands and face
          stained with ichor. oh,
now i see that alien glow more clearly!
it sits behind his eyes, sways along
with the light reaching through the leaves outside.

          oh, but i do wish, i wish, i wish
that things hadn't ended this way.
i wish the fates had reached
          some sort of agreement, you see -
                in this matter between you and me.

no point dwelling in what's gone,
and i'm quite sure i won't be here long enough
      to hear the last of the chants.
              and you know, and i know you know
              it would be rotten, rotten work any other way.

use to sit by a radiator
Early in the morn
Hours past that
I was unaware
Armed with my Bible
My notebook for poetry
Or thoughts that would occur
A peaceful time
Perhaps two or three
When souls are sleeping
And my heart is aching
For words to read and share
My radiator has since
Disappeared into new hands
Hope they find the magic
of warming your back
And cleansing your soul
I have