I like a whole lip-smacking smorgasbord of words,
such as preposterous and scrumptious,
sumptuous and curious,
roiling, rambunctious and trumpeting,
priapic, satyric and seraphic,
satyriasis and mimesis. Now this mimesis is the imitative
representation of nature and behavior in art and literature,
which is a pretentious way of trying to say what us writers do.
But hey, we don't just mimic things,
we can be sagacious and salacious, too.
Accordingly, I also like *******, which has a liquid sound,
and I'm not being facetious to suggest that
******* has a close connection to callipygous.
Then, for those who are suspicious of the libidinous,
I also like curmudgeonly and bodacious,
loquacious, precocious and pulchritudinous,
lubricious and fugacious,
scripturient, radiance, iridescence and magnificence,
lissome, lithe and languid (but not too limp),
shimmering and diaphanous, effulgent and evanescent,
flamboyant, fandango and flibbertigibbet,
(although this is difficult to say when you’re drunk),
voluptuous and vertiginous, slithery, **** and glistening.
And when I include crepuscular, strumpet and strawberry,
I may as well add whipped cream
as well, because this can be laid on in dollops,
and dollops is really an excellent word
along with slurping and *******, too.
Actually, I'm very flexible about words,
because in my lexicon, low moaning noises are OK, too.
These sounds come from the chord of creation
which is a sort of reverberation from the time of
primordial ooze, which I would like to squish between my toes.
Then there's protozoa, spermatozoa and also
wriggling flagella everywhere. So there.
But words don't even need to make sense,
because sweet nothings can say everything,
and heavy breathing can be ******,
even rhapsodic, ending in delirium.
Titillating should be in here too, because we all need
some tintinnabulation and tickling of the senses sometimes.
I've also decided that fecund is my second favorite word after love.
Fecund sounds abrupt, but it buds magnificently
in ******* and bellies to burgeon in absolute abundance,
everywhere. This brings me to *******, which I like, too.
I'm also partial to proud words, including bold, bulging and
brazen, along with a bit of swaggering braggadocio.
Then I like some big words, like brobdingnagian,
although I hope I'm not sesquipedalian.
Salivate is a word to celebrate as well,
along with onomatopoeia that helps choose some words here.
Drooling is highly evocative, too,
and it's not being provocative to observe that
even weapons drool when they're in the wrong hands.
And I shouldn't leave out *******, as you would expect,
because ****** is a sort of rippling word
that rhymes with spasm. Both sound deceptively simple,
but by golly, they can be intensely gripping.
And really, it's alright to writhe to this occasion
because all of us writers should endeavor
to have some good writhing in our oeuvre.
Even some bad writhing can be lots of fun, too.
But I almost forgot to mention yearning and burning (with desire)
and vulviform, velvet and venerous.
Yippee, yee har and hollerin' along with other exclamations
of exhortatory exuberance should be in this index, too.
Now. The words I don’t like include no, can’t, never,
stop and mustn’t. Also, irascible and intractable,
unmentionable, ineffable, inexpressible, incoherent,
immutable, impotent and impossible.
Then I don't like importune and misfortune,
and I don't know who thought up unthinkable,
because this is an oxymoron.
Inscrutable is also a complete cop out,
especially when there's no such word as scrutable.
Gawping, gaping, cavernous and cretinous, obsequious,
grovelling, pursed lips, circuitous,
obfuscation and isolation, unpalatable,
cruelty, tyranny and hypocrisy,
should also get the heave-**.
And I definitely don't like parsimonious and mendicant,
which are miserable words.
Quitting doesn't get there either,
and shut the **** up and ******* should also be taboo.
Also, hopeless is, really, well, it's hopeless
because it denies hope, and hope is buoyant and boundless.
I mean, sometimes hope is all we have.
But the word I dislike most is ****,
because this is an insulting word, and
to be taxonomical,
the negative score of this word is astronomical.
Hate is also right up there on this list. Hate is abominable
because it tries to destroy love, and love is indomitable.
Indomitable
is the
mightiest
word
of them all.
Yeah. So there.

Mike T Minehan

Whatever you do, keep smiling.
Be nice to everyone and stand up for your rights.
There are many paths to the top of the mountain
but few of them are on the map.
Keep running, never give up,
and watch out for the seriously weird.
Avoid psychopaths, if you can recognize them,
be polite to witches and warlocks, eschew cannibals,
beware of the hippopotamus in heat,
don’t drink the second bottle when dancing the Funky Chicken,
and only massage someone without
pimples or hairy legs.
Never give up and keep smiling.
It's a hard life, it's a beautiful world, life's a *****,
it's great to be alive, life is nasty, brutish and short,
don’t give up and keep smiling.
Everyone is a guru but ignorance is everywhere,
and don't mix hallucinogens with depressants.
If someone tells you that they're honest,
treat them with the greatest suspicion.
Live to the limits, we're only alive once,
and that's just as well, because
imagine if people you didn't like were immortal.
Keep smiling, never give up,
always hawk to windward,
and never leave your underpants or ******* behind.
Everyone's equal but only the strong survive,
especially when they take from the weak
because what you seize is what you get.
The meek shall inherit the earth,
but the earth that they inherit will be of
poor quality with no mineral deposits.
Party lots, work hard, never give up, and keep smiling.
Don't work so hard you don't enjoy yourself,
remember that the bird is on the wing,
then it falls off its perch and becomes
a miserable pile of feathers and feet.
The fast lane is the best lane
but it's very smooth and slippery
and there are no road rules.
Watch out for lawyers. Seriously.
They put the devil in the details
while their hand is in your wallet.
Everything comes to you if only you can wait,
but this takes too long.
Clean your teeth, obey authority,
except for arrogant *******,
and don't forget that love and pleasure are
most important, despite what anybody else says.
When you panic, other people will panic,
which is good, because
in this confusion, you can make your escape.

Mike T Minehan

This is a poem to warn you of the licentiousness,
the lewdness, the lasciviousness and downright
wickedness of language, especially,
the evil consonants.

Consider, for example, the subtle sibilant 's', seemingly innocuous,
but the consonant first heard in ***.  
And take the letter 'l', standing up *****,
the stiff one in this lustful alphabet.
All boys know about the upright 'l',
as in blind, which they'll go if they play with it
too much, double 'l', well, they'll end up in hell.

The consonant 'b' stands for ***, of course,
everyone knows 'b' for ***,
the bold, barefaced, brazen one,
or, on all fours, raised up, the buttocks form an 'm',
with an inverted 'v' between the legs.
And 'c'!  'C' stands for - for,  no, no.  I can't.
Let's just say 'c' is curled up, crafty, by the coccyx, where it lurks,
cramped and damp, hopefully curtailed.

And 'p'.  Well, 'p' is 'p', just as bad as 's' 'h' with a 't'.
And what about  'f'? Don't worry, I'll give that one the flick, dead quick.
'f' starts a word that's totally perverted.
If you think I'll use the 'f' and add the 'c' 'k',
you'll have to wait another day.

Then contemplate spreadeagled 'x',
the final letter in the word of ***!
These consonants are wanton.
'W' has its legs up in the air. 'w' is wild and wet. Wicked, wicked.
'n' is bent over.  Naughty, naughty!

And 'y', why, 'y's the legs together and the ***** area.
Also, be wary of people who like the 'g' spot in there a lot,
also those who roll their 'r's too much
and others who lash out with s and m.
'r' and 'g' and 's' and 'm' end up in ******!

I believe the higher incidence of ****** offence is due to the influence
of consonants.  It's no coincidence. The evidence is that *******
is social as well as ******, of course,
and there's a preponderance of consonants in *******.
Such coitus should be interruptus
before these consonants totally corrupt us.

Now, the only course for moral rectitude
against such a sinful attitude with the grossest moral turpitude
is vigilance. With discipline and diligence,
we must become the moral militants
in the fight against the sibilants,
the awful incidence of decadence,
and the absence of innocence,
that's the evil consequence
of all the cunning consonants.
Otherwise incontinence with consonants
will be forever on our conscience!

Now. Think of every ***** word you can. This sin will be absolved in heaven!
Yes, ******* has five consonants, testicles has six and ******* seven!
Gynecological has eight, fresh spermatozoa ten and prosthetic devices eleven!
Repent! Repent! Redemption lies with you.  
It's true!  Think of it! If you eschew the consonants in all evil or ugly,
you'll be left with the purity of 'a', 'e', 'i' 'o' 'u'.

Mike T Minehan

Poor little octopus.
Big head and eight tentacles
but no *****, ***** or testicles.

What's that, you say? Then how do these poor little cephalopods
buck such terrible odds when they feel like a ****** agenda
and they don't have any pudenda?

Well, it's quite simple, really. He hands her ***** on a tentacle
and what do you suppose?
She says, thank you very much, and sticks it up her nose!

Honest. No dinner first or shoulder massage,
she just whacks it up her nasal passage. You can be quite sure
this is an amazing olfactory aperture.

So the moral is, don't complicate a simple process.
When you're feeling frisky, *** need not be tricky.
Just consider the inventiveness of the octopus with no ***** or a *******.

Because it's the ingenuity of the octopus, not it's ****** act,
that we should court. Compared to the octopus,
the human nose is naught.
It's too high up and tight for such naughty, wicked sport.  

Also, such a human act is fraught with political incorrectness.  
A gentleman who tries this little rort to get the girls to snort
and says, up your nostril, madam, might all too well
receive a rude retort. Or even worse!

I say herein lies food for thought.
                                                        ­                             Mike T Minehan

So I’m marrying this young girl, see,
it’s the second time round.
My first wife died and
I’ve been struggling and drowning.
So I'm clutching the life raft
of this girl who is beautiful and young,
who’s romantic and sure of her ground,
and she and her family believe
that I can breathe and survive again.

Me?  Can I remember how to be gentle and kind to them?
It was luck. I was lucky before.
Because now I'm a veteran of the thousand campaigns
and I’ve bayed at the moon, see,
then I hunted with The Beast.

And anyway, my first wife and I
(*******, her name is Lorayne!)
suffered, and then suffocated
before our love soared so high.
Then we danced like fireflies, fabulously,
until the future ended forever.

So how can this new girl
find ecstasy with me and, and,
you know, live happily ever after,
which is such an impossible dream,
and how can I handle all this ******* purity
and innocence and beauty and youth
and flawless skin and fairy tale stuff
when I’m so gnarled
and twisted and knotted?
You see, I'm actually deeply ashamed.
In spite of my much vaunted campaigns,
I'm really a coward.
I'm afraid I can't drag myself back and do this again.
Can we possibly become fireflies and dance in the flame?

Yes, yes, I know.
We'll swear to love and to honor and to obey
in sickness and in health
in richness and in poorness
until death do us part.
Though this formula's too cute. It doesn't mention the pain.

But there's no other option. I must try to rise up again,
and alright, once more, I'll call on the flame.
So I'll cast out my demons and force them away.
Somehow, I'll hold those monsters at bay to give you
the light and the love you say
is still there, everywhere.
You are wide-eyed and oh, so naive.
But I desperately want to believe you.
I need you.
Oh god, I hope we can love without fear.

Mike T Minehan

Lonely word,
without rhyme or reason,
seeks meaning
and needs a good root.

Slightly faded but still opulent adjective
seeks mature sentence
and meaningful relationship
view long story
beside warm fire
with red wine.

Noun with no hang-ups
seeks juicy verb
for fun times
and swinging relationship.
Let’s split the infinitive together!
Conditional clauses not welcome.

Mike T Minehan

Look here.  I've been admiring the spectacle  
of Ng’s bare ****. Yes,
this is simply because I have to say
Ng’s bare **** is magnificent.
It’s not a bouncing Botticelli but it’s
a slim, firm bottom, subtly rounded,
real split peach and cream stuff.
And Ng at the other end
is a real nice girl, too!
She's my friend, see?

But back to Ng’s bare ****. Let's stay focused.
I contemplate this vision,
along with the meaning of life,
quite often in broad daylight
with a slash of sunlight across her little buns.
This is more profound than the Tait, the Louvre,
the Met, the Frick, the Neue, the Helly, the Hermitage or even
the Natty Portrait Gallery all bunged in together.
Ng's bare **** is also better, by far,
than anything you'll see at the Bolshoi or La Scala.

I’m amazed at how much I’m amazed by
this work of art. It’s awesome.
And I betcha the most famous galleries would
fall over themselves to display this finest little ****, that is,
if the world wasn't so hung up with hypocrisy and hysteria,
yeah, it'd be heaps more famous than the Mona Lisa.

Mike T Minehan

At the risk of sounding sexist
I’d like to pay my highest respects today
to the girl at my accountant’s
with the beautiful *******.
Usually the only things that jiggle there
are the numbers on the ledger,
but today a couple of numbers
stuck out for me to admire.
She knew it all added up spectacularly well
as she bent down obligingly
and pointed out where I should sign
and showed me what I needed to see.
She knew and I knew that
capital gains and expenses
were comparatively insignificant here.
Saucy insouciance was the obvious upside.
Of course, I shouldn’t have noticed,
but then I'm afraid that's what happens
when you’re more
of a ******
than an entrepreneur.

Mike T Minehan

When you're a writer, you get invited to strange gigs
sometimes, where usually, the audience is arty farty
or even a bit precious and pretentious.
You know, the blue rinse set.
But I was once invited to recite poetry in a bar,
where I knew my audience might be ******,
or maybe even abusive, and wouldn't give
a **** about writing.
Yeah? Well, I'm a bit of a word warrior, really,
so I didn't back off.
I stepped right in for the fight.

I said straight up that my poem was especially
for people like them who thought that writers are
wishy-washy, woffling, **** weak and luke-warm.
So then I said,
PPPHHHaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrtttttttt.
Very loud.

I told them this was some royal raspberry,
just for people like them,
who thought this was going to be another boring poem.
And then I threw in a few words like, ah, ****, doggy fashion,
finger up the ****, you know, just to liven things up.

I told them what I really thought.
***** You! Especially seeing as how you think poetry’s
some wimpy, bleeding heart, limp **** stuff. Right?
So let's get right down and ***** here.

Which is much more interesting, eh?
And do you know what that says about you?
No?  You bleeding, blinkered, blind-as-bats
broomstick-up-the-arsed, boring, bonehead *******!

So don't call this poet ****-weak any more
or I'll hit you bang between the eyes
and up between your thighs.
I've got some things to say you'd better not ignore.

When it comes to words, I'm a gouger and a biter.
I'm a brawling, hard-as-nails, no-holds-barred street fighter.
I'm a writer.

Yeah, well, no surprise here. That made them quieter.
I'd shut them up. So what did that prove?
I'd just abused and confused them.
It made me think, well, why did I bother?
Poems are for believers and lovers, aren’t they?
They don't need me to fight for them in bars.
Poems just are.
Yes,and some of them might live
as long as the stars.


Mike T Minehan

Today, I’m sharpening arrows
to aim them at
politicians with snouts in the trough,
clerics who preach peace for themselves
but hatred about others,
academics who promote freedom of speech
but run a Gulag Archipelago
for those who don’t follow their own ideas
or buy their textbooks,
hypocrites everywhere,
celebrities in general,
people who don’t smile,
people who aren’t nice,
(why are they here?)
fanatics, tyrants and power mongers,
(there are a humungous lot of these)
boring people,
(they wouldn’t be boring
if they could just try to engage a little more)
and those who block supermarket isles
with their trolleys while they stop and gossip.
I’d really like to put a few arrows in their butts
to puncture their pretensions and hear
the subsequent hiss of preciousness
unless they sincerely promise
to be more considerate
and try to love a whole lot more.
Now. I don't insist they have to love prodigiously,
but I reckon they could lighten the **** up
just a little, and try to laugh more frequently.
That's all.

Mike T Minehan

No, no, I haven’t been doing this myself,
but I live in Cambodia,
and 2 guys and a girl were deported recently
for riding around on a motorbike in the ****
in broad daylight. Actually, you see,
naively or deliberately,
they rode right past a police station.
Now that must have been a sight for sore eyes.
So the police set out in hot pursuit,
rubbing their sore eyes, or whatever they rub,
maybe their truncheons, eh?
And when the perps were pulled over,
the cops didn’t fall about with hilarity
when these riders said quite calmly
that they were going to pick up their laundry.
Truly! They were backpackers! As if that explained it.
But publicly, the cops said nope,
these perps are obscene to be seen like this
and they violate Khmer customs and culture.
The cops even took pictures of this outrageous obscenity.
Indeed. The riders' rapture of being bare assed
and naked and **** free is not for Cambodia.
Certainly not at this juncture.
So their capture resulted in them being deported,
never to show hide nor hair in the country again.
Just goes to show...
But you can get away with ****** here,
particularly shooting union leaders or critics or protestors,
or you can throw a grenade into the opposition,
and **** a few right there. Those killers go free.
It's probably dangerous to speak openly,
but I don't think these guys read poetry.
They're probably busy oiling their artillery,
and even rocket launchers, as the PM
threatened to use against the opposition recently.
Seriously.
They're on the lookout for dissenters here.
Oh yes. And bare *****. Obviously.
So watch you **** in Cambodia,
especially if it's bare on a bike.
And ssshhh! Watch out for your mouth.
You need to cover your mouth up properly, too.

Mike T Minehan

Success *****, as they say,
hellishly.  She's a rich little
seductress who's certainly sensational
at blowing a man's brains out.
I know.  She had her teeth into me.
I can smile now, but for a while
I couldn't get enough. She was hot stuff,
that ***** goddess, success.

I was a real sucker for her charms
when she came greasing up.
I really got into the groove
when she pulled me off to the gravy train
where we gobbled down every drop.
I tell you, I couldn't stop.
What a succulent princess she is,
that ***** goddess, success.

But after it had all blown over
and she was hanging out with other guys,
I had a few days when my eyes weren't glazed.
Maybe she was a bit of a *****, actually,
always hustling for more.
Attractive to woo, but really, she *******
them, always pushing to score,
that ***** goddess, success.

I met her again the other day,
and she ran her tongue over her lips. Jeez.
I nearly went weak at the knees.
But we're only old friends now,
and I'm over her disease. So I wasn't desperate to please
her.  She's such a terrible tease. She wriggled her assets
but I didn't ask her to come again,
that ***** goddess, success.

Mike T Minehan

What I should have said
when Mike Whittle died, was
what a mighty man he was,
though small in stature,
yeah, how he set the students’
minds on fire.
Instead I said
he always jabbed himself with insulin
while we were having lunch
and I said that this was a literary tradition
like Polonius being stabbed in the arras
and Mark Antony falling on his sword after Actium
before Octavian could get there ahead of him.
And then I said that Antony's lover Cleopatra died
when she arranged to be bitten on her ***** by an asp.
And I thought I was a smart *** by saying
don’t get confused and think she was bitten on her asp.
Well, Mike and I did laugh about literary allusions,
along with all that insulin and his pancreas,
during all of those immortal lunches.
But what I should have said was that students
worshiped him, and they said that
‘he gave me my love of learning’.
Mike, you mighty little giant.
And how I loved that you could laugh when the admin staff
tried to cut you down because they hate popularity so much.
Those blasts of laughter in your classes
frightened them and they thought you were
an iconoclast. Oh Mike.  I love you, just like all your students.
That's what I should have said about
the gifts you gave us all in
Learn, Love and Laughter 101.
This is your immortal epitaph.

Mike T Minehan

She came first in a dream
when I was fifteen. Yes,
she was the fire of ecstasy and her first licks
set my world aflame.
She's a shape-shifter, sometimes
fair and sometimes dark,
but always naked
when she comes.
She often whispers secrets
in the molten, swollen nights.
She even shows me jungles
and raging torrents down
where tom toms throb.
But when the morning breaks,
and I'm alone,
I struggle to remember.
Accordingly, I search the cities,
the far off mists and mountains
and the subterranean rivers
every burning day.
So it won’t surprise you to know
that where I mostly go to find her now
is under the volcano,
the place of endless fire.
It's where us dreamers and those demons
dance with our desire.

Mike T Minehan

Sometimes I cup her breast
while she sleeps curled up.
Sometimes it’s just the merest brush of skin,
the toes, perhaps, that meet somewhere
in the shoal of sheets.
Maybe it’s just an arm flung carelessly
or a leg akimbo here or there.
Her flanks are also sleek and smooth,
and is it a dream I sneak
of riding wild and reckless
through the canyons of our sleep?
But mostly, just simply holding hands
stops me tumbling in the void.
I don’t know if she knows
she's my bridge across forever.
Oh yes, I know that I'm a dreamer,
and I know that forever never lasts,
but I still hold her, oh so gently,
through the darkness of my night.

Mike T Minehan

I tried to write a poem about The Woman,
but I read it again and didn’t like it,
because it sounded like I knew what I was talking about.
Well, I don’t. Not really, no.
I’m just desperately grateful
that some women noticed me, and some
cared about me and gave me
the world. Their world,
which means everything, you see,
including comfort, fierce loyalty,
and most of all, acceptance and forgiveness.
Forgiveness was their greatest gift of all.
So this stuff about
cosmic kaleidoscopes of desire,
and delirious dreams and
raunchy ***, and, and,
pain sometimes, is,
well, it’s only partly true.
Incandescent love is unconditional.
That's what they gave me, see,
and this all I want to humbly say.

Mike T Minehan

I don’t want the world,
just a mountain and some waterfalls will do,
yes, and a tropical hideaway
with a palm tree or two,
an outrigger canoe
and you.

If only I can find you again.
Where are you?

Mike T Minehan

I’ve got to tell you,
yes, you, Muse,
that you can be a real little ****, sometimes,
just flirting with me
and merely swirling your skirts.
And I’m so ******* vulnerable!
You hear that? I’m weak!
I’ve been meekly saying yes, yes,
thankee missus, so pathetically obsequious,
while tugging my forelock, or something else,
before scribbling about these ridiculously tantalizing
little glimpses you’ve been flashing me,
just the merest ****** of insight,
when I so desperately need, you know,
the whole ******* vision, the complete picture.
Yes. The whole enchilada!
Now look here.
You’ve got to go a hell of a lot farther than just flirting with me!
I need some of your hot little chilli, see?
Something, you know, incendiary!
You hear me?
Maybe sink my teeth right into your euphorbia poissonii!
Yes!
Even if this ******* well kills me.

Mike T Minehan

I’m part of the archipelago today,
just a little island lying around,
with a lagoon and some palm trees,
and here I am shooting the breeze
with you.
So I hope the rest of you islands
out there are enjoying the birds,
maybe an albatross with a preposterous
wing span, some turtles, and a castaway
with a bottle or two.
There could even be a galleon on the horizon,
with pieces of eight and doubloons.
Maybe not, but so what?
It doesn’t matter when you let go
and say Hi ** when you’re
part of the archipelago
today.  

Mike T Minehan

I must confess that a while ago,
I wanted to be a superhero, you know,
to blaze like a thousand suns and shout
hello, I’m here.

Yes, you're right, it was a bit pathetic, really,
but you see,  I was afraid of being
just another speck
in the swarm of time,
swallowed up and
insignificant.

So now I’ve changed, and
I just want to say
hello,  I love you.
Love is incredibly more
incandescent, iridescent and resplendent
than all that hero stuff and blind ambition
and all that exhibitionism.

Maybe my spandex suit was too tight in the crotch,
or whatever, but so what,
I now don't feel the need to be a superhero at all.
Yeah, so all of those old galaxies can spin around
and glow in the dark
and wheel through time
as much as they like,
because I’m doing just fine now,
simply being me, right here.

And anyway, love is much more fun
because love is when you don't have to
wear your underpants on the outside,
like all those superheroes.
Actually, and this is very logical,
because when you're a lover,
you don't have to wear any underpants at all.

Mike T Minehan

Hey my little sweetheart,
I want you to know
that I’m launching this poem
across space and time.
I’m posting it up in the heavens
to let the universe see
that I love you
utterly and completely
and unconditionally.
Yes, you died in my arms and
flew far away,
but your light never left me, see,
and now I'm sending it to glow
gloriously across the galaxies
over all of time.
Yes, your name is Lorayne
and now you will never be forgotten.
You should reign as long as
love itself is loved
and as long as
love poems light up
the darkness of our lives.

Mike T Minehan

******.  Come back,
you faithless little ****-tease, Muse,
you maddening author of my abuse.
Please don't amuse yourself this way.

I know it's love-hate,
de facto, inchoate.
But don't you know I seethe for seed
and writhe to write?

I love you, Muse.
There must be some mistake.
So end this wretched heartache
and for art's sake,
light my ******* fuse!

Mike T Minehan

This message is coming to you on the  
Cee Haitch Zee. This is the
Circumstellar Habitable Zone
for those who don't know astronomy.
I'm god, see, from the other side of the sun.
Yeah. I’m the omnipotent, omniscient
and magnificent one, or, if you can look at me directly,
I'm the Dazzling One.

Now the reason for this xenology
is to tell you the secret of the suns
and to vent all that cosmic stuff,
including the terrestrial file
on life and death, the splendid and the vile,
religion, and why I **** innocent children sometimes.
There. That orta be enough for a while.

So look. I’ll keep it really simple here.
The reason for everything is,
it’s um, gosh. Well. Would you believe?
I don't have this immediately in front of me.
And anyway, it's been a very long time
since I dragged you out of slime.

Now don't go getting emotional here,
because I'll delegate this to Harahel,
he's the Angel of Knowledge, or maybe Gabriel.
Although I suppose we could leave it
till the Day of Trumpets, judgement and hell,
y'know, and go all traditional.

But I really don't mean to be threatening
at this stage,
so I'll get back to you on this one later,
and then I'll give you a shout.
Yeah. This is god calling,
over and out.

Mike T Minehan

I can’t help thinking
that almost every girl I meet
could possibly, potentially be,
yes, a screamer in the sack,
or better, a soul mate in the sack,
or even a confidant in a coffee shop, or anywhere.
And then they could jointly rule my kingdom
imperiously, like the Queen of Babylon,
or maybe Bathsheba, who was having a bath
when David espied her and then jumped her in his boudoir.
I suppose an exhibitionist needs a ******.
Gee. But it wasn't kosher for David, the King of Judea,
to then have murdered Bathsheba's husband, Uriah,
so he could afterwards marry her.
What? Yeah, this is all in that whodunnit,
the first tabloid, the Old Testament.
But look, I'm getting away from the path here.
What I'm talking about is girls that I innocently meet
without trying to get them in closer.
I don't spy on girls in the bath or the shower
and I don't have anyone murdered for *** or for power.
Or for anything! I'm a writer, see?
I simply imagine, inside my head,
that we all fall fabulously in love,
and blow our minds instead.

Mike T Minehan

I just heard a colossal clap of thunder.
By Jove, it’s great to be reminded that
the din and clamor of our lives
are insignificant compared to those like Zeus.
There’ll soon be rain, and after that,
a glistening rainbow hung out to dry.

Those guys do it big up there in the heavens,
and then they rip the sky apart with lightening flashes, too.
Howzat?
Yeah, an’ then there’s all their galaxies and time an’ stuff.

Jeez, I just love this great big art gallery of the gods.

Mike T Minehan

I met a ****** today,
and no, she didn’t actually tell me.
She kept this tight and was
really shy and polite about it.
But I guessed, because, well,
she's passionate, and trembling on the brink,
like a strung bow, quivering to release,
and she's straining to please her father,
who has the highest standards,
and the rest of her family, who have the highest standards,
and she has the highest standards,
and she's trying to live up to these highest standards,
and her Khmer culture is conservative,
also with these highest moral standards.
Gee. There are so many high standards here,
except for politics and the ****** of protestors
in this country. They're a high standard of
retribution and execution, in the back of the head.
Yeah, culture can be cruel sometimes,
especially in Cambodia.
Anyway, this girl’s trying to keep it together
and, well, there’s so much I could teach her.
But, look. I’m not the one to give her advice,
or to point my finger, or anything else, here.
It’s called the journey of life.
She has to figure it out and fit in for herself, see?
But wow. She's really beautiful in this innocent way.
So maybe you'll forgive me, briefly,
when I think of toxophily, improperly,
not to mention other recreational activity.
But honestly, I like and respect her,
and I appreciate her integrity.
Although I wish that everyone
would just wish her to be happy
instead of all of this responsibility and respectability
stuff about morality and virginity.
And for those who try to keep her in purgatory,
well, I wonder about their own purity. Yeah.
Just a few thoughts on equality
or maybe jealousy or hypocrisy here.
But hey! She's twenty-two! It's her time to be free.
She can still have *** and be pure.
It's called love, see? Not necessarily matrimony.
And anyway, virginity's not for a committee,
this is her own destiny.
Love is the answer.
It's really simple. See?

Mike T Minehan

Substantial reward
paid for the following lost items:
sense of endless time,
boundless ambition,
athletic body,
presumed omniscience,
undimmed enthusiasm
and blind optimism.
Former owner wants to
restore original self
and has not yet lost hope.

Mike T Minehan

So. You lit up our world
like the trajectory of a blazing comet
and landed in the middle of our lives,
plonk. Just like that.
We’re talking here of a little supernova,
and a whole, dazzling, new dimension.
Yes, you were smiling, crying,
shamelessly dependent and incandescent,
lighting up the world with love,
while saying, in effect,
don’t worry, I’m the future now,
what isn’t written yet is here with me.
Well, you didn’t actually say those words,
because you’re only ten months old,
but that’s the essence, really,
of your arrival in the terrestrial
and your trajectory from the stars.

Mike T Minehan

The loved ones I watched die
taught me about acceptance
and transcendence and most of all,
love. This was even though I was
deep in the abyss after they died,
but I realized later that this abyss
is where I learned the lessons
about living. Without the abyss,
and their gift of love,
I could never have known this.
You see, the power of their love
was the light towards which
I climbed out of the darkness.
Their death was a beginning
and a giving. This was the process
of passing their light on to me,
and theirs is the light that guides me now.
This incandescence is a sustenance
that glows with the golden strength
of giant, gentle suns.
It's mighty. And magnificent. And humbling,
because now I know that
love is the light that lives forever.

Mike T Minehan

Give me succor!
Yes I need a lot of succor because
I went down to my word factory today
and there was no one there.
They just walked off the job!
So how am I supposed
to write anything meaningful?
Eh? Words fail me!

But if nobody gives me succor
and I’ve gotta set up my own Succor Center,
there could be some serious misunderstandings,
like, you better give me some succor
or I fukka you up right now.
Yes. There are people out there like that.
And others who want you to toss their salad
not to mention those who think I said sucker
instead of succor and that I'm asking for
some sloppy top. What?

But hey! I’m not going to stay silent and suffer.
So now I’ve designed a T shirt
with How About Some Succor? on the front
and I’m going to wear this and try to sell these
and see what happens.
I might even get some succor after all.
Or something.


Mike T Minehan

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways
I failed to tell you that I loved you,
and let me count how many times
I forgot to say you were
the most beautiful person
in my world.
Oh my darling baby,
when you were dying
in my arms,
you could only just hear
my hoarse, desperate voice, too late,
and now, for all of eternity,
the grave grasps you in silence.
In my hell, I shall but love thee better after death.

Mike T Minehan

My hometown was rough
because teddy boys and mods and rockers
off the cargo ships from Glasgow and the docks
and slums of England rocked the streets
and knocked the local toughs
out silly with their knuckledusters.
They also slashed them with their razors and their chains.
Yeah, but my friends and I had a revolver
when we were kids
and we used to try and shoot out streetlights
on dark and stormy nights.
We missed, but we could have shot
those boaties close up for all their street frights and
all their ****** peccadilloes like ******* local girls
and leaving a league of nations in their wake.
We didn't pull the trigger there,
but they shouldn’t have got away with snickering
among themselves that they could
pull girls’ knickers down when they wanted,
and scare us with their their flick knives.
We let them get away with thinking
we were easy pickings
in that small town where I was born.
But it’s just as well, really.
I'm glad we didn't take their lives.  

Mike T Minehan

There should be rules
about girls asking “will you marry me?”.
when they’re giving you a *******
and then they wait until just before
the Convulsive Cataclysm,
before they say, “so, will you marry me? Eh?”
Or even worse,
admitting their lover to the voluptuous depths
of their Secret Garden and then
pausing to say “will you marry me?”
just after they’ve peeled the curtains back
to offer the Apple of Omniscience.
I mean, of course a man is humbly grateful,
but he's not thinking clearly
during the calamity of ecstasy
and the drowning pools of pleasure.
There should be rules.

Mike T Minehan

Oh I wish you were here,
in my arms again
like the night you breathed
your last.
Yes, so close to me
and yet so infinitely far away.
So far away, that
I finally knew the meaning of
forever.
Oh my little baby.
I’m reaching out to you again tonight.

Mike T Minehan

If only I could write a poem
as brazen as an orange autumn leaf
tumbling along the street,
or sounds like rain
drumming of on an iron roof
or the rich, deep smell of earth
after the rain squall passes,
even the murmur of breeze in trees
and the song of cicadas
on soft summer evenings.
Yes, the single call of birds that thrill me,
or the magnificence of the setting sun
saluting the end of day.
The spin of sycamores
like little helicopters in the wind
and then, of course,
the dragonfly that darts and pauses
so impossibly along the lazy rivers.
And what about the lotus blossom
and the flowers that bloom in billions,
every day unseen?
The hulk of mountains holding up the sky.
The effervescence of the Milky Way
wheeling across forever.
Then there’s the kaleidoscope of colors
caused by a single drop of oil on water.
Smudged mascara after tears.
The majesty of self.
A child’s hand holding yours.
The gift of love.
A smile.
If only I could write these poems.
If only I could write.

Mike T Minehan