the house was painted
a soft hue. an old tobacco trap;
discolored white where
pictures once hung.
in the kitchen, grease stains,
faded bluebird wallpaper —
long since ceased it's song,
and one cast-iron skillet off to the side.
pale and forgotten,
the fine china shrieks!
my barefoot innocence
is lost as the cold-colored
porcelain eats at the floor.
sometimes when I lay there covered in
turpentine, stars usually topple
out of the cabinet,
and my gas stove aspirations are botched.
the sink drain moans with the silent
invectives of an impure saint…
her rosary still atop the mantle.

just outside, a stone angel
that smells of lilies, —
savagely eats rosebuds over
an autumn bonfire.
from time to time
her face is one of lament…
it follows me from room to room,
and my hands shake for hours
while holding little antique figurines
in a basket full of milkweed…
they’d tuck at the curtain,
their little music box voices
complain about her eyes...
they'd scurry up the ivy on the side of
the house to avoid her
disappointed glance…
there was a sad wingbeat as
I stepped out on the balcony to collect
them one last time.

I could hear the echo of a ****** closing in, but from which direction
I could not for the life of me tell.
The caws and cries soothed my soul
And my eyes were closed,
So that I could immerse myself in a Yorkshire breeze
That gently brushed itself past the timeless trees.

With my wake came the crows
-Of which restored my sanity-
And each wingbeat brought yet another colour to the dusky sky,
As if time were something that could be carried.
A magpie,
A reminder of home,
Perched itself upon a fallen post and rattled furiously at how temporarily tranquil
I had become.

Then a charming mist made its way across the valley
But this only enhanced the clarity of my current surroundings.
The clouds in front of me began to wisp and merge like cigarette smoke against an ever-dimming lightbulb-
That reminds me,
I still need to get that fixed.

I noticed that my neighbours were cows,
Which I saw as a treat and a rarity,
Not in any way as a delicacy to be consumed and exploited for the good of humankind-
I digress.
Not the cows that I see everyday at, say, sixth form or in
Human form.
No, the cows that I usually see in packs
On supermarket shelves;
On butchers' racks
Before the people that behold them with hungry, selfish eyes.

As I gazed in this melancholy daze I knew that I would begin to miss the sight of those unsuspecting beasts from the minute I got back to where I was from-
To where I was born to live,
Unlike those in the fields that are
Born to die.
So then I swore to myself that I would never again
Look outside.

‘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.

I traced the mountain skyline
Placed at rivers bend
Trying to recapture the beauty
That once made my heart a butterflies wingbeat.
The dullness filled that landscape in comparison

If in my lifetime
I were to capture a sight of you once
In a moment of time
I would praise the starry night sky
That cast a glimmer of light upon your face

You could have heard
The wingbeat of a wingless bird
I was frozen in place
Stiff, with a stone for a face
Legs heavy as mountain sized blocks of granite
Probably not a force on this planet
Could have moved me, at least I doubt it

After all the hate you’ve radiated
All the silence you’ve created
I am welded to the wall at my back
Not strong enough to
Take the two steps that it’d take to
Walk over and sit next to you
Tell you how many things
I wish that I could take back
But you do the thing I can’t
The last thing I think you’d want
You get up, walk, take two steps and stop
Sudden.
Sit facing me
A face I never thought I’d see
Look at me again
Especially not with that spark in your smile
It
It always told me when
Your smile was real

My eyes trace
Every inch of your face
In glances
Glances like the dances
Of shadows chased away by midnight
Broken by firelight
Yours trace mine

I take in the complex mix
Of tears hiding in your eyes
Shifting glances sliding by
Subtle smiles bursting I
Think I see a remnant of friendship
Hoping just a little bit
Hoping for a hope, that’s it
Think the (soft ,strong, wavy, weak)
Punctuation of our voices when we speak
Reveals it almost perfectly

I chew on every word I hear
With every word I speak
And the whole time we’ve been talking
My heartbeat has been shaking my rigid body loose
Stone skin sloughing off
As if I were a cement snake
(I feel like a snake)
(in the background)
(and in the background I think)
(this might be the feeling that makes)
(both our smiles sneak off our face)

We speak in broken sentences
And repeat ourselves
And speak in
Broken sentences
It sounds to me like
Words begging to be heard
Being heard again
Again
But for the first time

I passed by a lea while
walking in the prairie
grassy meadows sprinted
towards green horizons

bumpy hills
and rocky crags
clothed the verdant meadow
willows and gum trees
shaded the countryside

She was like an oasis
I fell in love with the lea
with her alluring grassy hair
and fertile aura

I sat down in her *****
and curled up in her supple
valley

Smooth sunlight trickled down
on us
watering the lea in a dandelion glow

The scent of apple cinnamon
and radiata pine wafted towards
me spicing the air with the lightness
and beauty of a butterly’s wingbeat

an ineffable sigh
escaped from secret chambers
of my heart
and leaped into the romantic air as
I wedded this lea
under the turquoise sky
with the sunlit trees
as witness

No more long, slow days
of pushing through
fatigue and boredom,
we've stagnated long enough
they say.

Now the wind kicks up a renewed warmth
that greets us in the morning over the white-capped mountains.
Now the sun sets and shrouds a cloudless sky in gold.

We hear voices, whispers
saying someday soon we'll go out
to ****
or be killed.

And it's scary how much it excites us
to fantasize about death;
about our role in catastrophe
and the empty glory.

Sometimes death hurtles through the beautiful
high, azure sky. And leaves
not a mark, not even a cool shadow on the ground
as it flutters harmlessly to the earth
bemusing us. underwhelming us.

Some weeks are so quiet
that we touch the nuts and bolts
of true nothing
too much.
000000000000000000000000000000000000000
feel too little and lose sight
000000000000000000000000000000000000000
of our purpose. Lose sight
000000000000000000000000000000000000000
of the need
000000000000000000000000000000000000000
00000000d000000000000000­000000000000000
for one. Lose sight
000000000000000000000000000000000000000
of memories of ******* by the fire.
Lose sight of what there is
to guard inside of us, to keep
000000000000000000000000000000000000000
whole and untouched
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000
.
Lose sight
of why we're
guarding it, why
we're trying to, need to. Lose sight
of what the air tasted like back home.
We just lose.

Sandstorms kick up giant tornados
of dust, pebbles and sand
cutting silently across the burning concrete.

We stand
in their way,
constantly.

To keep busy
we tell
the same stories
so many times.

Now they dive out
of our mouths dropping weightlessly,
not even the strength to carry a wingbeat.

We barely believe ourselves anymore,
that's what we say.

winter morning;
vived blue sky
hidden with a spread
of white,
and some gray

a small, gentle
waterfall
intermingles
a riverstream
guided by
old, dramatic,
crooked
trees
that bend
touching the water;
a green field
at the other bank
corners it all

a small,
light
bird
lands on top
of one of the trees

at a small breeze
the bird departs
across the green field

one strong wingbeat –
breeze softly carries
another wingbeat –
go with the flow