Nobody heard them, the 900,
But still they lay screaming.
We were much further out than they were,
And not waving but drowning.

Poor migrants, lured to a better life –
Now they’re dead.
It must have been too hot for them
In Gambia, Senegal, Syria, they said,

Oh no no no, it was too hot always,
Still, the stranded ones lay screaming.
We were much further out than they were,
And not waving but drowning.

You can't write poetry without feeling something.
Even if its nothing, you can't write poetry without feeling something.

Home is a red-shuttered house with over-
grown hosta plants, sold to a Chinese couple
whose translator loved our hummingbird
feeders and the way the house faced East.
We had a swimming pool, frog pond, two
pink bikes and matching helmets--mismatched
childhood memories nine years behind me--

we moved to a ranch, where I painted my room
the color soft, baby grass fighting through
wintergreen fertilizer, the kind my father
scattered over our front lawn, hoping to grow
something above the underground spring
flooding muddy, brown, saturated as we
became when my mother remembered her
locked-away childhood, my father broke
his back, my sister succumbed to self-blame,

and I cleaned up after it all. Our ranch holds
these events in its powder-blue walls, creaks
at night and wakes me from a dream repeating
nine times over--where I stand inside that red-
shuttered house, beside an eleven-year-old
me with honey hair bleached from too much
sunlight, speaking softly: you’re almost home.

satellite of lust
stopping the presses
essentially broken
entrancing machine
never back-step
epileptic idol
old ways are dead
adhere to the lies
essentially broken
entrancing machine  
netting a good one
nearer to mid-life
fed up with the ghost
starting blank again
in a different palace
cemented to space
cemented to space
cemented to space

I started with a mirror,                                      
with questions of who and why.
But he just stared back at me,
reflecting what I already knew.

I met with a prophet,                                
who gave me a what:
The illusion of God,
and He was the only way.

I searched for a philosopher,
but was met with several.
Each had conflicting whys,
but none a who.

I moved on to science,
and it gave me a how:
It told of creation,
but never the why.

I read some books;
each had their own why,
And each character their own who,
but it was just fiction.

I looked at old photos,
and found an old me.
But I could not see who it was,
or what it all meant.

I turned to self help,
which told how to find who;
But this notion was sold to me,
and I lost more than I gained.

So I went back to my mirror,
and I broke it.

nowadays they  have  to pinch the  ends

of their  cigarettes  before they  cross the  threshold no longer allowed to  herd  the  crumbling swarms of ash  across  the  gingham veldt


outside the  window, on the  pavement,    lies a  bible and  the  radio declares their  readiness  is high
seems like a  good   night to let the  smokers in and warm around a  last  embered light


on the  table I  browse  the  “priest“ they  called him

in the  centrefold, deep in the  heart,  a  flyer,

man’s  journey  into christ,

I  guess  we’ll   find out  soon enough the  veracity  of the divine



but until the  young-un  and the  white horse riders have  decided who can  ****  the  highest
leave us  to the  daily diary  and  its  tales  of

days  of ******* each  other’s  husbands and  wives



I  bought a  Dylan Thomas book one the  way  home, from the  junk  shop,
when I  got it  back  I  saw blood   on the  back cover

I  licked my  finger  to  wipe it  off but  she  said  “no!
you  fool“

sure  it  carried  the  plague of some cursed lover



I  plagiarise myself

a  drink  is most definitely in order

the  tawny  coolness tock tick toxic keen  as  the sharpest  dissection
and  then  you can  find me   not just  like everybody else but  just  like

everybody  else,  lying, hemi-hydrate,  below  the bridled  tension

of  life’s  meniscus

a certain morning stiffness
in your joints

you find your face
in the bathroom mirror
and wish you hadn't

the puzzled wisdom
    of middle age
wavers from your eyes
deepening wrinkles
   of many laughs
   many frowns

   how many more?

   nevermore ?!

the room becomes aflutter
with poesque ravens
the presence of absences
fills the void
your life is on the brink
of deconstructing itself
to the periphery of the universe
a discourse of silence
forever becoming ... becoming ...
what...?

   nevermind!

so

you close your eyes
   hard
for a minute or two

when you look again
you meet the stare
of a not-so-bad-looking
man in his best years
  
   graying sideburns
   receding hairline
   20 pounds too many
      BUT
   a firm decision
   to work them off
  
   still a bit sleepy
   yet determined
   to shave
      get dressed
      have breakfast
  
   and teach
   that wonderful seminar
   on 19th century poetry
   to eager graduate students