"barclay" poems
So then the Gnostic heresies issued in one of two beliefs. They believed either that Jesus was not really divine but simply one of a series of emanations from God, or that he was not in any sense human but a kind of phantom in the shape of a man. The Gnostic beliefs at one and the same time destroyed the real godhead and the real manhood of Jesus.
from: The Gospel of John by William Barclay (1955)
Gnosis reveals in reverberation:
you’ve done too many **** hits.
You sprawl at the threshold of psychosis
until the shape of the song fits.
Your cannabis-flavored thoughts implode—
you glimpse the Divine Emanation
as the lesser vibrations diminish and die
now you enter the shrine of elation.
This rare revelation—imparted to you
(the neurotransmitters surge)
seems to show that you know, that you know, that you know
the deceptions of Demiurge . . .
Oct 6, 2017
Oct 6, 2017 at 7:19 PM UTC
(Jenny's Granny's house. Ayr.)
Where seasonal root veg soup
Warmly journeyed our throats
Granny Jean, skin translucent as glass,
Sheer, showing tendril veins beneath
Crinkled cliff-edge lips at Jenny's budding womanhood
She knew hers lay as barren
As insignificant as the pale Mojave borderlands.
Brazen-cheeked dolls and pastel bears
Audienced my transition from slip to sundress
Back in the lucid haze of the pensioner's kitchen
Where dust particles hived like antique film grain
Sat Jenny; painted lips like crisp apple skin
Freckled cheeks hollowing atop
Her milkshake's flimsy plastic straw
Raspy, bubbly ***** filled
The kitchen; appliances groped
By the pious smite of the sun
The kind of light they say never to walk towards
Then, a weathered cough and the stiff moan of a rocking chair
Just to jest fate
Was none of our business yet; I was taken by the hand
We pass many exhibits
On the austere lilac fridge:
"Mr. & Mrs Richard D. Barclay, wed on 11th of Oct 1961"
And crayoned from her own hand, aged 10; "Me and Granny B"
A waxy glyph on lemon sugar-paper not always in memoriam
But among the moth-wing wallpaper lilies
For now
Dust dunes like mattress ghosts
Collect in mushroom clouds above Jenny's sudden weight
While I feed myself to the mirror
My frock, flesh, hair all seep
Into the totalitarian whiteness of our room
And I am happy if this is my course through life
I know I'm no one
I try on, as I shake goodbye,
Jean's hands; fire-crafted leather baseball gloves
They do not fit just yet but
When my hands no longer sheen in the virtuous sun
When I feel citrus hand soap grate into each wrinkled chasm
I promise you, gran, I will remember
Even the Mojave desert will see rainfall.
Feb 25, 2014
Feb 25, 2014 at 8:42 AM UTC
The after life part 9
Today Cronus was even more busier than ever sending people to their next lives and his latest person was 14 year old beryl stone with her two sisters Harriet and sienna who were on their way to get ice cream when a drunk driver came out of nowhere and hit them and killed all 3 of them together and Cronus said beryl, Harriet and sienna, who do you want to be in your next life, do you want to be together or seperate and you will lose everything in your next life and sienna said I want to be with beryl and Harriet but if it can’t be done we want to be together as best friends and Cronus said ok, is there anywhere you will want to go in the world and Harriet said, not in Australia, that’s for sure because people say it is the lucky country but we weren’t lucky in that car, I like to go to the USA, where we could have anything we want, and beryl and sienna said yes, USA for us but beryl said in different families because I want to meet one of them and marry them and Cronus said well I can’t guarantee that but that is something you must work towards doing and sienna said, what is going to happen to the crazy drunk driver and Cronus said well I can’t do much there but I will guarantee he will get what is coming to him and then Cronus sent beryl and Harriet and sienna to Athena for a soul check and after that they went to Saturn for a methane ice cream spider and then travelled around the universe hoping they can have a forfilled life and then Cronus saw famous horse trainer Tom Barclay and said who do you want to be in your next life and Tom said I want to be a racehorse so I could win races and be cared for by the next generation of little girls and boys and make my jockey win a lot of races and my fans win a lot of money and Cronus said yes but we are supposed to mend each blade of grass by helping people, you seem to encourage gambling and Tom said yes, I know but it was hard to be a human, especially after I got sick and had to get away from the horses and if I was a horse I will be around horses all the time, and I can mend heaps of blades of grass that way, I won’t live as long as a horse, maybe I will want to be another person after that and Cronus said, what could you offer people as a horse, I could ride children and adults around and I could keep horses from not going extinct and Cronus said that is mending blades of grass so he sent him to Athena for a soul check and Tom went to Saturn to ride dinosaurs high on methane and then Cronus had Kenny Harrison who was a volunteer fireman who died tackling the south coast fires and Cronus said what do you want to be in your next life and Kenny said I want to make a difference in people’s lives by helping people to rebuild their lives from natural disasters and Cronus said yes but I can’t give you much there except give you the helping people spirit abs put you in a family who wants to make a difference as well, so you could learn when your next life becomes an adult and Kenny said ok I will hopefully won’t get bullied into helping people by them though, I want to make a difference in what my calling is, and Cronus said ok no worries and sent him to Athena for a soul check and then to Buddha to get a helping people spirit and then Kenny went to Jupiter to help stop evil spirits from causing hurricanes and Cronus said it is great that he wants to mend each blade of grass
Feb 11, 2020
Feb 11, 2020 at 2:07 AM UTC
I find my finger tracing silhouettes of strangers
As I tap my foot and stare outside the glass pane in front of me
Onto the street where passersby greet the crisp morning air
With knit scarves and hats and boisterous jackets and saddlebags at the hip,
Ready to ride into town and run out the sheriffs in charge of the show
On West End and Broadway.
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Flurries of snow greet the ground with thunderous applause
As I sip my brew, intertwining fingers with my mug like lovers
And tracing silhouettes of strangers standing at the corner
With my free hand.
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The silent footsteps remind me of the cars at Piccadilly Circus on the first snow of the season,
And how all rhyme and reason belong to silhouettes of strangers that walk past the storefronts and stoplights and billboards and Barclay's
Instead of the steady sound of tires screeching and stopping traffic
In this picturesque place.
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A winter's day in New York is a lot like a winter's day in London;
Silhouettes of strangers are outlined by the fingers of fresh-faced people sipping coffee in a corner café.
They tap their feet and wait for a silhouette to escape the bellowing silence of the snow and the roar of the barren roads.
All they want is to intertwine their fingers with another,
Instead of a lukewarm mug.
Aug 24, 2017
Aug 24, 2017 at 10:03 PM UTC