in-between cherry blossom
faces,
the dragon.

the red of the tulip
contained in my gaze
—shouting

i find it, like a book finds its reader.
like the reader finds an old friend between the pages.
and the friend, their love returned in full.
and love, its givingness become relay.
and searching, its pilgrimage.

moss on the rocks
fed by the stream passing over
—slip

alas, i've heard it asked: how can we
write poetry after Auschwitz?
i don't know. and prose? i don't know: gone mad
the whole world implodes and dips its dove's foot into my purple brow:
in a dream, ink erupts from under my dirt encrusted fingernails
and it is the transubstantiation of my rainbow stained blood,
and the void was flooded:
what's a word? more than i—more than i can show.
how did they write poetry after colonialism?
after other slaves and other genocides?
i don't know. Rimbaud traded in slaves, and, before his fury,
wrote masterpieces... perhaps its obvious; a bad pun, to help us cope,
—he even left the path to his divinity,
but all this has nothing to do with anything—.
perhaps every genocide needs its herald poets.
and the rest, how did they write? i don't know.
perhaps it was not their concern;
they desired to write, and there, they did not give way, and so
were right.
and is it the same with us, as we write
through the screams of the however many millions coming from Congo
and from however many other scenes similar? i—
perhaps i do not need to know,
perhaps, in fact, i cannot write poetry.
if i'm to try, it pertains to me to be of use in case this comes to a fight.

and life, if life is drama,
then there will always be roles:
there will always be the part of the villain that needs playing,
an immortal space to be filled by actor after actor,
we cannot stop them, we cannot stop them;
our enemy is a hydra's head!
the task, then, is to re-write the script!
ad lib won't cut it!
cast away your hope, boredom and wonder:
we'll need fire and a pen mightier than a golden sword,
and softly spoken words that can split history asunder.

who could you be
if not metonymy
under another name?

i am compelled to write poetry
in much the same way
as i am compelled by my
bowel movements:
the process, experience, and results
are pretty much no different for me.

your exotic skin
sends echoing through me
drums
that demand adventure.
bless—curse them, making me tremble.

envy sustains me,
envy of the flowers that bloom
in adversity.
such marvels, whereas i,
but a blade of grass, for now.

the body of the name lying naked on the tongue

the touch of rust

the sunset at the change of the season

the sea coming home to a lonely shore

the lips asking for more, the ears the amorous organs

emptied of echoes, the cities built on bones

from scrambled noise emerges syntax

that conjugates attraction in parallax

and someone or not-one spoke a metonymy of solicitude

in the beginning in the end, in the garden in the ruins

events ever fragile, encounters that were almost nothing

the hounding difference between a thing and a word

between us and us

between the data, the predictions thereof

and the unexpected

that we have not yet learned to trust

the body unspoken, the touch untranslatable

by that time every body ventured
had been a surrogate. a gateless gate
left completely unopened wide
so too was i. pretending pretending.
they emerged out of nothingness like
heart valves. metaphysics could not hold them
shut or otherwise. the step-ins force me
down and out like the street hands ignored.
i am just a shadow in the dream of a ghost
of these flows of light that are lost on you
like so many endless turning maelstroms
at a molecular level, i too
not noticing through all the commotion
i am in the orbit of a black sun.

sometimes
the script is already written.
sometimes it's ad lib.

it's true that the more poems i wrote
the more women i made feel uncomfortable.
sometimes this made me cry: it's tragic, after all,
when people don't recognise greatness.
and i am privileged to have been witness
to my tears
and the algae their oceans bloom,
and the violence of understanding so luminous
that i keep my vision black
for fear of what might
come to light in the shadow of my eye.

i think someone once told me
that i'm a good listener.
i've never heard what i wanted said.
don't forget me,
i never follow my own advice.

i find myself in some of the empty rooms
of my soul, and shout:
what are you doing?! it's mysterious outside!

i couldn't keep a cool head
and now the ice caps are doomed
which means the rainforests are doomed
which means the ocean algae is doomed
which means the permafrosts will melt
which means we're all doom bound.
of course, given Man, we're on course to be early.

the echo full halls
of my historicity are painted
with disaster
and haunted by the light
of a collapsing star.

there's always a lot playing on my mind
and i never really want tomorrow to arrive.

these depressive episodes have been put on a playlist
and set to repeat. the screen has our attention hostage.
i leave my sleep to the genesis of sunlit dreams
and let it eat the majority of day.
already sick of my share of time;
force fed countless pointless hours
of whining, pining or hiding
by my own hand that i'm biting,
and platefuls of pressure and fake faces
that i ***** behind;
binging on escapes destined to forsake me,
guzzling my own requiems to the potential for strength;
but i'm getting ahead of myself.

we share the shelter
of my lonely head.
so much to do.

my body is a temple
desecrated.
sacrificing commitments
to addictions.
such a repugnantly reactive creature.

there's a child somewhere inside of me
and he's crying his eyes out.

he annoys me so much
that i locked him away alone in a dark room.
i didn't actually lock the door,
i just told him i'm locking it
and he's too timid to be defiant
and too weak to lift a body laden with freedom.
so i just told him he's staying in that room
and i told myself to set the structure on fire.

there's a child somewhere inside of me
and he's crying his eyes out.
his incessant tears have waterlogged the entire tomb
while outside lie monuments of drought.

in search of
blue mountains,
sun hidden.

days of wanting
days of having
days of losing

days of wanting again
days of having but not the same
days of losing what never was

days of wanting what cannot be had
days of having what will always be lost
days of losing whatever remains

waiting praying begging

for the days
           to come a little less
                                    predictably


          ­                                                             sudd­enly—
                                                           ­               out of nowhere


days without want for anything i am not already
days unconcerned with having anything i am not already
days of laughter and dancing and friendship without end

and i
for all my foresight
never saw any of it coming

if only i could be the night
so as to find you looking,
full of wonder,
into my eyes and abyss.

‘Once fire is the form of the spectacle the problem
becomes how to set fire to fire.’
—Joshua Clover, ‘My Life in the New Millennium’

i’m back
back with a thunderclap.
no wait, scratch that.
back with a thunderous tone from the seldom seen soul
groaning lonely long sung melodies, if it please.
welcome to a kingdom of dreams
and agony.
a stone’s throw from here:
a face
Unseen.
and somewhere between(:) low
oceans rolling under the moon,
a storm approaching,
crazed wind whirling,
my sails unfurl, searching for the open seas of your gaze;
sick of being furtive;
i live and i yearn and i speak what i learn
and i know when i haven’t earned it,
too often too stern and i know you don’t deserve it,
i know everyone i know and too many more deserve so much more
and for them to have this i live and i yearn!
Justice!
for this i live and i yearn
on the turning earth that gives
no rest to the world weary
left alone
to burn out, i burn out, i burn out
i rise from the ashes
a phoenix grasping wheat and hammer in its talons,
seeking to pass out gifts and set fire
to fire itself, to sing Clover in the streets,
to render the helpless
helpless no longer.
i am (not) unbroken
like infinite waves.
friends fan the flames of my brazen heart
ablaze at three minutes to the midnight of my flagrant soul.
a toll on your life,
a tax on your poverty.
shouting: no more!
shouting: we will not settle for less than we are owed!
shouting: down with the dictatorship of the plutocrat!
shouting: down with the rich Man’s socialism!
shouting: …
in a fantasy, odiously
no more, doubt ridden,
not yet traversed nor even intraversed,
not yet reified, not quite versed;
apartheids’ unovercoming, voices atrophied,
walls rising higher, reception terse
and curse those bless’ed curses
transdescending themselves
in blessings through me!
they haven’t yet found me at my worst
so things couldn’t get worse if i hurt them.

my intentions a mess,
my effect bereft.

wake me from my slumber, let be the aching of my chest;
let the heaviness of my heart be the weight of solidarity;
let be! the political is personal to some, life and death to some:
that’s why i’m so glum, chum,
they’re killing quicker than i finish another straight ***…
****.
and on our own soil too – see, it’s partly not for oil;
blind to land grabs and assets stolen, our toil exploited – that’s what’s up.
can’t handle serfdom? physical, mental, or spiritual health problem?
abject subsistence and misread decisions not assuaged by some other ***?
unconditional basic income?—say what?
choose starvation, hypothermia, suicide, fear—
it’s a numbers game
and every loss is a ******,
it’s ****** up.
state cuts ****, zombie banks ****, transnationals ****, TTIP will ****,
our heroes are experienced
as torturous humiliators and mass murderers in other countries,
it’s ****** up.
and reactions to shock and awe, pollution, imperialism and stolen raw materials be the chorus.
and i hope the NSA and other such state ***** hear clearly what i have to say.
and always from the pools of blood,
money trickles up.
structurally omni-parasitic,
-cataclysmic, -containing
an unlucky lucky one formula;
“profits today, **** tomorrow!”;
a system of mass extinction and violence;
cultures of hate;
distain for compassion;
secret social cleansings;
privatised gain, nationalised pain;
a plaguing absence of understanding;
sanction fetishes;
rational genocides;
wages; ***; television; grumpy cat; death drive;
armies of invisible slaves and pillaged unpeoples,
and sordid crowds of visible ones in denial or denied;
and an honest and patronising pastiche poet!
to not even begin.

but a promise shall be a promise.

weeping won’t get it done.
i shall muster my forces even before four horsemen,
the long attricious charge toward a universal freedom from fear
and hierarchy shattered
under banners of equality axiomatic sworn.
my wingbeat shall be adorned with thunderous applause,
it shall disclose smokescreens and it shall cleanse you of opiates
and not just those you have in mind.
watch me soar, join these skies;
rise above the immoral laws and their warped economic concord;
be aware of where the wealth is hoarded;
don’t concern yourself with lies,
concern yourself with liars and who they’re lying for.
be wary where your desire’s from.
there’s still longer than a long way to go
but your sense of urgency is needed now.
the shadows of the Bomb and of ecological catastrophe now grow longer
than the shadow of death
in any old sad song in history
in scarcity, surrendering abundant potential for post-scarcity
to strings of the superego, demons, conductors, controllers
and orchestrated outrage!
and i know we have more to lose than our chains.
but the view from the night of Terror is of the far off tranquil stars
and the moon never brighter!
bind, unbind, entwine.
i will not leave behind only wasted time.
find yourself, find the source, give out your hand
to dance, to share, suffer, fall—
find the hand of another, there find recourse—
and consider the Call, and consider the Course.

ashamed of my face and all that lies behind it.
every mirror a reminder.
what a waste of time.

and so what have i to offer you beyond
a collection of cheap and naive sentiments
matted in the dust of ineloquence?
i miss you, is all, but not even you:
an image of you, but not even an image:

the ghost of a fantasy. yes, i am
haunted, haunted by your absence
your senseless existence your
orbit without mass or distance
and all the rest, in its restless fabrication.

all that remains are your artefacts
with i among them, not quite intact.

a toast,
a toast to every moment of clarity forgotten,
to every splendid line i put off writing down
until i could conjure it no longer,
to every sentence i should have spoken
and every silence i should have kept,
a toast to every deception i miscalculated,
to every promise broken, every bond neglected,
to every question i failed in formulating,
to every time when i should have wept
and every time when i should have refrained from weeping;
a toast, a toast to every embarrassment, every disgrace,
every regret,
to every time my hand should have been extended
and to every hand i stubbornly refused to accept,
and the rest, too, a toast to all the rest.

what else is there to do on nights like these
if not to get drunk
on memories,
the stronger the better? every spectacle
of microcosmic tragicomedy,
that makes up the vortex of my life,
is sublime before these disordered senses,
before it's revealed to be
pathetic and melancholy in the morning's lucid, lurid light.
a toast, then, that the night last the longest
and the next day pass by quickly enough.
a toast to every moment of clarity forgotten,
to every splendid line i put off writing down
until i could conjure it no longer,
to every sentence i should have spoken
and every silence i should have kept.

the empires that seep into the marrow
of the bones breaking under the weight of
ghosts from every time period leaden
with unrevolted tools – unreal futures
exchange on tomorrow collaterals
echoes of empty homes unheard amid
the jeering of parliament and bomb drops
racket media revolving doors all’s
for the taking when it comes to foreign
resources or big business building walls
and the means to defend them and to send
people fleeing as if turning treadmills
of off-shore profit in hoards and stomped on
for state’s sake or fossil fuels which are like
investment banking and nuclear subs:

we do not need them, they will **** us all.

i've heard it said:
we keep a special place in our hearts
for those who refuse to be impressed by us.
every time you like a poem
that isn't one i wrote in hope of ensnaring you,
i become slightly more obsessed.

children racing
on their bicycles. somewhere
war in a colonised land.

after twenty years, my life is still embryonic:
i guess it pertains to the self-same me to be tragic and comic.
by this age, Rimbaud had already renounced poetry, leaving
in fury shattered instruments of alchemy and sublime scrolls
from hell, scrawled impeccably in drug-infused-blood and divine
protest, depicting beatific visions of love, infinite aching bodies
and disordered senses;
by this age, he had already heeded the call of adventure,
known destitute poverty and absolute ecstasy, triviality
and magnificence,
and was bound for an obscure exploration, marriage,
trading in slaves
and was past half way to a tedious death.
but what have i seen? and what is this?—merde!
after twenty years, my life is still embryonic:
i guess it pertains to the self-same me to be tragic and comic.

contrails crossing on sky blue.
and you?
and me?

awake
waiting

for the call
that isn't coming.

be my bow,
and let the tension
of our love be the archer;
turn me into the arrow
and the bullseye.

i love the sound of my own shuddering, bellowed
voice
because i so seldom get to hear it.

the books in my room gather dust.
time turns to satin—on the shore
of ideas, an old boat coats with rust.
in the wind echoes its engine's ancient roar.

children play their games in the street.
ashes of the sun flushed down the toilet.
all things seen and unseen begin their retreat
as fun comes to an end, the adults spoilt it.

not a day goes by—that's all, that's it.
no one wants even to ask if
                                                                 we're going to make it.

i hold it, like roses hold on to the snow.
like the snow holds on to the cobblestones in the sky.
and the sky, its wandering light.
and light, its arrival in its absence.
and releasing, its weary seeker.

i flee from it, like time keeps fleeing from the clock.
like the clock flees from its last stop.
and the last, its living truth.
and life, its vast unnameable.
and questioning, its pallid resting place.

i forge it, like the moon forges the waves.
like the waves forge the cliff's labyrinth.
and the labyrinth, its single thread.
and the thread, its thousand fragmented words.
and dissembling, its puzzle pieces without end.

i ask it, like a sinner asks forgiveness from a God he believes dead.
like death asks of life nothing but patience.
and patience, its tender faith.
and faith, its open hand.
and answering, its fragile soliloquy.

i reveal it, like the holy spirit reveals itself to non-believers.
like belief reveals shelter from its own incompleteness.
and incompleteness, its secret freedom.
and the secret, its anonymous keeper.
and hiding, its unspeaking reply.

i seek it, like the waves seeking to return from the beach.
like the beach seeking footsteps unfading from the sand.
and footsteps, their fierce stampede.
and ferocity, its crystal shape.
and reaching, its impossible limit.

i find it, like a book finds its reader.
like the reader finds an old friend between the pages.
and a friend, their love returned in full.
and love, its givingness become relay.
and searching, its pilgrimage.

i hold it, like roses hold on to the snow.
like the snow holds on to the cobblestones in the sky.
and the sky, its wandering light.
and light, its arrival in its absence.
and releasing, its weary seeker.

glass goliaths steal food from the poor without voices
to feed fat pockets.
eat the rich.

take any society:
the most productive element
is women.
the most rewarded
is man.
(and the most annoying
is the one lamenting the state of affairs
who disrespects his mother.)

the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded,
and goes rotten, and skeletons of industry rust.
people are starved, drowned, blown up; profits are made,
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth travelled north - taken - into open arms,
those brave souls in flight who followed
were left to the waves or destitution.
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded,
hundreds of thousands of houses are empty,
and skeletons of industry rust.
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded,
and goes rotten.
justice will take more than just good deeds:
open the borders, break down the walls!
produce and allocate according to need,
and there will be enough—for us all!

the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded
and goes rotten, and skeletons of industry rust.
the cities are littered with bodies with suits and ties
stepping over them. dangerous speculation leaves behind another gutted home.
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded
and goes rotten, and skeletons of industry rust.
in all of history, never has the world been richer, never
have individuals been richer, and communities never so barren.
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded
and goes rotten.

children cry up from the depth of debt for bread and help and shelter
met either with the ideologue's injunction "AUSTERITY."
or deaf ears and tax-payers money
invested in guns and bombs sent abroad, and rhetoric behind the barbed fences of our shores, and the tools for plundering all the people and every corner and resource of the earth and the as yet still fluid future: the tools to cement our early doom.

all that is wretched is integral to the structure:
it is what the system stands on, everything it crushes,
squeezing out the life and stealing it;
we must come to understand this, and step back.
we'll have to face—or be forced to—collapse.

the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded
and people are forsaken, starved, blown up, drowned, deprived of voice and value;
profits are made. life comes at a price, too much for most.
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth travelled north - taken - into open arms,
those brave, desperate souls in flight who followed
were handed - abandoned - to the waves or absolute destitution.
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded—
"SAVE THE BANKS, SAVE THE COMPANIES, THEY'RE TOO BIG
TO SINK"—they're titanic—"THERE'S NO TIME TO BE DEMOCRATIC—IT'S A STATE OF EMERGENCY—THEY CANNOT FAIL."
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded,
hundreds of thousands of houses are empty
and skeletons of industry rust.
the country isn't poor at all:
the wealth is just hoarded,
and so the world goes rotten.

justice will take more than just good deeds:
open the borders and break down the walls!
set no destinations at which to arrive, but towards horizons strive;
we need not firewood, but the seed:
make union and defiance your call!
open the borders and break down the walls!
produce and allocate according to need
and there shall be enough—for us all!

(and i might add: please,
forgive me my youth and naivety...
but i am no believer in the Fall.)

there are signs out there.
almost nothing.
but if you follow them
they can lead you
to a world that will always
be more
than what you know.

the candle
flickering
—everywhere, nothing at all.

and we were looking out forever in
opposite directions but there
was nothing behind what we
could see when we turned around.

and what else could tenderness be if not
revealing what you've kept
hidden even
from yourself?

defiance, maybe. resistance against a time
such as ours, for a time coming, if it's coming,
not so callous, our hearts, if they dared
at the edges of nowhere.

of your love nothing is known
but the event happened
therefore you exist.
indisputably.
between a name and
nothing at all.
if you insist, if you can.

you must resist

all the world's temptation to
yield
for the hazard of
something singular.
of your love nothing is known
as it is with all
processes of truth-becoming

traversing

eternity

and back again, in a flash.

a fascist walks into a bar
that you're swinging into his face
like you're knocking it out of the park
with all of your might
because it is the only
appropriate course of action.

you'd think enough had already been
written on the topic of being:
think again.
i can't bear to be without you,
it isn't worth the time,
over and over, thinking about, not being—with you.

small bird darting across blue,
when i look back
you'll be gone.

saturated with angst,
i don't go with the flow:
i sink.

the body i live with
does not appreciate
the thoughts that keep it restless
in the early hours,
the ones i won't part with.

we hide ourselves
in hope that someone, some-when,
would want to find us.

i set out like a madman
into the streets of alibis
looking for a word
as incongruous as love.
before i knew it, all the lights
were switched off.

quand sera la prochaine fois?
une lumière aveugle
montre mon chemin.

/

venu de ****
mes semblants, trouvant la misère
qu'ils se sont enfuis.
touche pas à mon pote!

i make my approach,
mimicking plaintive movements
of the colossus
cloud structures migrating
across serene vastness.
-----their blue plains
-----are my green plains;
-----their source
-----is my source.
i see a silhouette
wandering on far off hill:
i wonder...
the crows leave no trace in the air.
their cawing has caught my heart
like a hook would a fish.
the unrelenting wind at my back
will not have me turn back:
i am promised to the forest.
at the edge of the trees
is a grave, modestly
marked by a small wooden cross:
perhaps it is my grave.
i enter ungracefully
into a forgotten kingdom of grace
ravaged.
the earth, so full of life,
is carpeted with death:
brown leaves crunch beneath my boots.
the webs of ivy i traverse make me feel unwelcome.
elsewhere, on trees fallen
and others not yet so,
merciless ivy and giant vines constricting.
elsewhere, the singing of birds unseen
in beauty.
the whispers of trees are
earth shattering, soul cleaving:
freeing me from my confines concrete.
everything that does not seem still
trembles—
do i seem still?
the trunks of trees are robust like my being;
i look up, their high reaches sway playfully,
gently,
as sun rays gain entry also
and remind me of my duties
which i am gift to.
it's true, my dear Emerson:
perpetual youth is found in the woods,
but we mustn't tarry too long.

hell now. hell later. heaven lost.
earthbound. lost-bound. losing ground.
never cede the territory of desire.
ever hell. keep on. keep lost. on-bound.
dispossessed of a heaven at your feet.
your feet treaded heaven, your body enfleshed heaven
and can again. ever again. earth again.
hell now. hell later. ever on.
never lost. no-where to be found. now-here found.
now-here on. no-where lost. now-here bound.
no-where bound.

i'm subjectivated by the gaze of your coruscating eyes,
i must risk disaster, fly, and not be petrified;
that smile, that smile inspires a desire,
a desire to inspire that smile of yours myself.

could this be the final destination
or just another step in the journey?
you and i, and the countless nameless, all
united in struggle—but where, then,
the exclusion, the adversary, the exploiter?
who holds the pen that controls the course of this story?
and is it running out of ink? must we
steal it for our own use? or snap it and
start writing only in pencil or pixels?
or is the paper on fire, opportunity turned to smoke?
perhaps the kingdom of ends and heaven
shall never be inscribed onto the earth,
not even for a brief, hard won daybreak.
divided we stand on the polluted planet,
where walls rise higher and bigger bombs fall daily,
where camps overflow, half starve and so many displaced,
where private capital propels technology
and its shadow of terror and invisible chains,
and genocide is a good price for oil and raw materials.
could this be the final destination
or just another step in the journey?
neither philosophers nor poets can tell us;
if we can find the People, maybe then we'll know.
for now, at least, some of us have tomorrow.

have i spoken of a saviour? rejoice, hear woe.

there is no one to save us, no one to save us:
God was made flesh and died on the cross erected by Empire:
Christ the Rebel murdered, forsaken by Himself,
and a Book brings down Rome;
His suffering image lives on, the Holy Spirit of Resistance lives on
if we choose it: we are absolutely
responsible—absolutely responsible
for our own destiny. wherefore the spear?
it pertains to believers of Truth to move mountains stone by stone.
equality and welfare over wealth!
perhaps it is our turn to cast fire
and we must learn how to set fire to fire itself.