"marrakesh" poems
Dressed in black, dark eyes amused
She strolls into a room
With the specialised tread
Of a femme fatale,
Tossing her streaming hair in arrogant joy.
Her perfect body
Contains the calm and unexpected force
Of the sea, shifting in a moment between
Reason and fury.
She graces the men with sure-footed Arabic,
Stark, sibilant, passionate words
Laughing like a poem.
A Moroccan beauty,
Guedra dancing in the sun,
From the desert coloured mosque of Casablanca
Punctured by the worship Of 70,000 songs,
To the unremitting souks of Marrakesh,
Her complexity
Emboldened by the courage
Of poets.
She has a silence in her intellect
Such as few have,
Unusual evidence of a soul
In a world of franchises,
Her past imaginings deeper and wider
Than that of her peers,
Dancing to fast Gharnati rhythms,
Beneath imagined Andulusian sunsets
And glowing skies.
An effervescent scintillating gasp of fervent
Desert air, beating across her limbs
Moving gently towards silence.
Nov 12, 2015
Nov 12, 2015 at 10:55 PM UTC
The loving puddle in the gutter off market street-- the one that fills with dirt and **** and damp newspaper, plastic soda cup, strange indecipherable Chinese pamphlets with bleeding characters. She smiles at the sun and renders its visions on her face, and with great tension attempts to demonstrate her willingness, her blushing consent to being totally subsumed by its whims. Of course she trembles at the diurnal stampede of feet, but is not afraid-- for she too speaks in eternity. She has evaporated before-- she has kissed the incessant sky over Marrakesh in the soft morning and dreams of the sparkling mountainsides in the night, when she is divided by callous rubber tires or cast below by competing distant rains. Yet she has always found her way back home; Nestled in the subtle indentation of road besides the brickway near Battery.
"Dewdrop, let me cleanse
in your brief
sweet waters . . .
These dark hands of life"
It was one of the waning days of winter, in the blurred haze of rains, when we left the coast and began our journey home. As she drove, I watched the pebbled streaks roll across the window into great vertical streams, to be cast off indistinct along the stationary road. Upon all our sides, Even the black-toothed mountain tops lost their grandiose summits into the fog. Off the road, next to the sagging remains of a gas station, a man sat beneath the naked fist of an old willow tree. He, with a teal umbrella, twirled the nylon circle so that the collecting sheen of water spun and spiraled centrifugal out into the bombarding camaraderie of fellow drops. The damp fields sat empty of life behind him, casting into evanescent black oceans of dirt. As we hurried past, I turned back-- and following him with my own watering eyes, I watched for as long as I could--until he too faded silently into the mist.
Sep 4, 2018
Sep 4, 2018 at 3:27 AM UTC
Venomous slithering silk gown
Adressed the chandeliers in the
Marrakesh's dusky evening, just
To outshine the simmering glass
There were gentelmen and ladies
Chit chating politely, uninterested
Awaiting on a dinner to be served.
He noticed the scarf, she thougt to
Herself. Unending in memory are
Hoffman's grand thrilly fairytales.
I wish he'd gather the bold pirates
Of his conquering intentions and..
Feb 15, 2016
Feb 15, 2016 at 5:48 PM UTC
You entered the bar
at the base camp
outside Tangiers
the morning sun was out
like a fresh orange
on a blue plate of sky
some old Moroccan
was in a corner
playing a guitar
your mouth felt like
the inside
of an Arab’s sandal
Mamie was sitting
at the bar
on a wonky stool
you woke up then?
she said
after last night
thought you’d be out
for the count all day
no I can take
a good night out
you replied
taking the stool
next to her
and breathing in
the hashish air
and smell of salt
from the beach
the guy behind the bar
asked what you wanted
and you said
*** and coke
and a salad roll
and he went off
and you looked at Mamie
her tight curls
and snub nose
and interesting
fall into me
eyes
what time
did you leave my tent
last night?
you asked
when your tent companion
turned up and almost
got on top of me
ah yes
sorry about that
Will does tend to come
at awkward times
I think he went off
to a trip to Marrakesh
in the yellow
ex army truck
almost crushed me
she said
good while it lasted
then eh?
no it wasn’t
she said
besides you
were out for the count
after we did things
was I?
you know you were
don’t recall a thing
you said
thank you Mr. Romantic
she moaned
o come on Sweet thing
you know it
meant a lot to me
having you near
she looked at
the old Moroccan
playing the guitar
I am glad
he doesn’t sing too
she said
she sipped her Bacardi
and sat silent
the guy brought
your *** and coke
and salad roll
and you began
to eat and sip
can I have some
of your roll?
she asked
sure
you said
and broke off
half of the roll
and gave it to her
thanks
she said and smiled
you felt her knee
touch yours at the bar
naked flesh
on jean cloth
her jean shorts
ended
at her high thigh
you remembered kissing
that thigh
the night before
amongst other things
the smell of her perfume
and the mustiness
of the tent
the faraway voices
and guitar sounds
some party
at the beach
the night before
hoping no scorpion
had crept in
during the day
feeling her
beneath you
and the sound of sea
far off
and sight
of moon’s glow
through tent’s skin
some one sang
another laughed
some one puked up
away off
too much to drink
but you and Mamie
had a good night
you mused
I think.
May 2, 2013
May 2, 2013 at 2:19 AM UTC
Miriam came
into your tent
at the camp base
a few miles from Tangiers.
She zipped
up the tent
behind her.
I saw your friend leave
he's gone
to Marrakesh with others
on the yellow trucks
she said.
I know
you said
he asked if I was going
but I said no.
She knelt
as the tent
was too low
to stand.
Shall we?
She said.
If you like
you said.
She took off her top
and her bra
and her small ****
hung there
the brown dugs
smiling.
You undressed slowly
all the time
watching her
as she sat
and slipped off
her jeans
and then
her underwear.
Outside there
were voices
of those who
never left
far off
and some nearby.
You were both naked
she kneeling
you lying
on the sleeping bed.
She crawled
towards your bag
and lay beside you.
I hope it's
a long way
to Marrakesh
she said.
Far enough
you said.
She gazed at you
and you drank in
her stare.
She touched your thigh
you touched her nest.
A slight wind outside
rattled the tent pole.
You entered
her smoothly
as a ship
into a fine harbour
and sailed her
over seven seas.
Always to serve
always to please.
Dec 26, 2016
Dec 26, 2016 at 3:01 PM UTC
hello Poetry....remember anvils soaking in snow
bejeweled in Hello Kitty
cringing in the Marrakesh of so much pantomime ?
Are you singing that song ?
the one you scrawled in a fit of distance
on the edge of ***
with the
Unknown....
hello Poetry... swimming in ego butter... Lobbing off heads
in a red blue !
the stem of a lunacy
branching
into corridors
of soot
and last
rites.
Oct 9, 2011
Oct 9, 2011 at 1:55 AM UTC
Drives to the lake in the dead of winter
where frost hushed every living inch.
These were my favorite.
Leftover snow cakes the water’s still edges.
The scene looks like a cheaply-framed painting
that someone abandoned at the Goodwill.
I smile, because we cherished tchotchkes like that.
The beauty, it’s there, if you tilt your head just so.
This girl, with her magic, she taught me
how to find happiness in the simple things;
that song that you’d love enough to memorize
could save your life on a sad day.
Boys were simply there for amusement;
adventure was only a car ride and a trespass away.
Life was at its coolest when it was secondhand,
and price tags were a waste of paper.
The farmer’s market on the one-way
was our very own Marrakesh,
where we’d fill the air with spices
and let them trail on the tails of our long sweaters.
But drives to the lake in the dead of winter,
where the stars seemed to wait
for us to fill the space between them with laughter.
These were my favorite.
Wrapped tightly in scarves, we’d oblige them;
happy that we could not predict the future;
happy without knowing this end.
Mar 28, 2017
Mar 28, 2017 at 3:38 PM UTC
A jaded tree I held,
felt the rough bark
between my fingers,
my hand
cupped the texture,
smooth & uneven,
glazed hues of
malachite,
azures & cobalt
titillated my senses.
I was intoxicated
by the aroma of mint,
tasted the raw honey
that warmed my heart
& produced an inner glow,
traces of Marrakesh
linger yet.
Mar 7, 2014
Mar 7, 2014 at 2:53 AM UTC
I came across an old house,
In the tumult of the Marrakesh Medina,
Cluttered with a frenzied pace
And mutterings of Berber foreign to the Western ear.
Yet, this old house, which was anything but a
grain in the midst of the chilly hustle,
Possessed my curiosity as only mud was the floor,
Drifting to decay
As the wind howled through its door.
There, an impoverished family dwelt,
In a space so dismal and rude,
And though gnawing sadness they felt
They had not a morsel of food.
The children, dressed in tatters and rags,
Cried to their poor mother for bread
Of which she held none.
Cupping their faces with looks of despair,
She said "Do not cry, or my soul will not spare"
Well then, let the wealthy and merry
See such a scene!
That in an old house in the depths of a medina,
They may know miseries are declared.
Jan 7, 2019
Jan 7, 2019 at 9:36 AM UTC
Ancient are the wrinkled lines embedded deeply on the face
As ancient as the sands of time adrift across the shadowed dunes,
As ancient as a deep abyss which spirals sand to windblown grace
A hidden place of time eternals' grace where texture looms.
Those looms of fibre, richly hued, in textures from forgotten time
Where hawkers clad in dusty robes in alleys shrilly called their trade
Of fabrics woven, coarse and tight, in sepia’s arresting rhyme,
To angled shards of golden light spearing evening’s satin shade.
As lantern light of haloed glow throws comfort small to dying day,
While nearby camels amble by, aloof to all but masters call,
Now chewing cuds of nonchalance, oblivious, which is their way,
Shadows grow to velvet night where diamond starlight distils all.
Ancient are the wrinkled lines embed deeply on this face
Of time eternal’s passage here imbued with passing ageless grace.
M.
17 April 2016
Apr 16, 2016
Apr 16, 2016 at 10:57 PM UTC
Sipping beauty
And coffee
Children and mums
In pieces
The deaf
The blind
And torn
Closer to the God
Who loves
Innocence
A smell of hate
And heat
Survived
The
Angry blink
That 17
Could not
Apr 7, 2016
Apr 7, 2016 at 11:53 AM UTC