FAMILY VISITS
with grateful acknowledgment to Ascent Aspiration
Visitors to a conditional world
punctually as always we arrive
every second Tuesday at ten thirty
we descend from our battered Mercury
bottle of cordial and
smiling ham sandwiches
packed into brown paper bags
next to the photographs
of the family
the adored magazines
and the cheap new underwear
She was not on the picnic littered grass
not in the stained stairwell
smelling of urine and cracked paint
where the same empty eyed teenager stands
eternally masturbating in the corridor
not in the deserted dining room
a few old slices of bread still on the peeling table
not in the TV room
where a single spectator stares
vacantly at a flickering screen
We found her in a tiny rancid room
two untidy metal beds and her wheelchair
everything smelled of forgotten yesterdays
today our forced smiles unreturned
she stares through us shamefully
arms covered as always with rosy psoriasis
the tears run dirty streams down her cheeks
she does not recognize us
We wheel her out to the grass
open the bags the bottles the photographs
she ignores them all
tears river from her dimly
seeing again her only movie
the classroom
she, blindfolded stumbling
trying to pin the tail on the donkey
the children laughing jeering
pinning to her back a lifelong sign
that says kick me
And here she sits crying
forty six years later
struck down by some undiagnosed disease
unrecognized untreated
a forgotten angel
The hour over we wheel her back
we don’t look at each other in the car
we could have done more
should have done more
A POETRY READING
with grateful acknowledgment to Free XpresSion
They came from Dublin
from Wexford, from Killmore Quay
from the Scottish highlands
and from holy Jerusalem over the sea
youngsters mainly, but here and there a head of gray
to an evening of poetry
in a centuries old hall
whose yellowed floors and sculpted ceilings
had housed a jail, survived a famine
whose walls were stained with years
of Irish blood and tears
One lass bravely recalled a childhood abuse
smothered by pillowed years of shame and guilt
a hairy man shouted testosterone phrases
like a peacock strutting
at us and at his plain compliant partner
An English girl remembered her
intellectual and sexual awakenings
in libraries and bookstores
a Scotsman spoke of the winds on the moor
an Israeli painted word pictures of Judean hills
a city lassie fondly joked about her little car
Just a poetry evening
but the walls listened gravely
in their understanding Irish way
sometimes sighing
at times shedding a new silent tear
Only a few pages torn from unfinished books
nothing new was said really
for most of them, only the walls
and their memories live on
BEWARE THE COLORS ARE CHANGING
with grateful acknowledgment to Free XpresSion
I am a soap bubble. Wave froth. Impermeable.
I am hardness. Black light. A countdown
of flashing digits, blinking off.
I am a candle. Extinguished. I cling
under rocks. In crevices.
I am an anvil. An iron mountain. Lightning
discloses the scar across my face.
I am a prophecy. Tomorrow’s shadow. Smug.
Time stretched to its thinnest membrane. Nothing
about me returns.
I’m metamorphosing. Red into red into red.
Don’t wait for me.
THE HITCH HIKER
with grateful acknowledgment to Harvest International
Monday night’s train stretches its way across the Karoo
pausing to pant for a moment in a tiny siding
barely a clutch of windows, hens scratching in the sand
while a yawning passenger, leather suitcase in hand, descends.
Three wooden houses dot the boredom, two lit behind quiet curtains,
the third darkened, dreaming behind a patch of dusty petunias
Lying on the middle bunk, twelve years old, on my way to summer
camp at the Cape; South African Railway blankets tucked up
to my ears, I watch him anonymously as we chuff out
—making his way between unwinking desert stars and misty
December moon, the lamps fading away into a postage stamp
Around the campfire, sparks shooting slowly into the smoke
of a ghost story, I saw him, recognized his brown double lapeled
suit —the hitchhiker, appearing again in the wavering beam of
headlights as the driver twisted the wheel to avoid colliding with him
and then the bone-splitting moment when he vanished
—to reappear dusty and unscathed at every station, each bend
in the road, to raise his hand beseeching in the dark
Thirty years later my Mercedes broke down in Sinai, somewhere between
Dahab and Santa Katarina and trudging back to the last crossroads, I cursed
my luck and middle eastern garage mechanics into the plummeting
thermometer of the evening dunes and then in a dustcloud formed between
the gathering grayness and the purple peaks, I saw twin beams approaching
—a Bedouin taxicab on its way to the coast, and raised my arm to flag him down.
The engine roared, gears crashed down and with a gritty whine of burnt
rubber the cab rocked past horn sounding slit eyed trumpets into the hills.
And as it vanished round a bend in the final red glimmer of taillight, I looked down
at my dusty shoes, my brown suitcase, my failing legs, my still raised arm.
And somewhere in a grimy notebook, a dreaming youth drifted past, head first,
six feet above the vanishing track
SEAMUS AND TED REPRINTED IN SUFFOLK
with grateful acknowledgment to Poetry Super Highway
Houseflies sullying bread,
muskets upside down
never intending to do harm,
greedy calipers on black metal legs,
some tools of the blacksmith’s trade
an anvil waiting to form some glowing bar
from red into a hook or an axe,
claw pliers for extracting old nails
all these decorate the cover
Our eyes take in
a wandering pig (hungry for the slush?)
a bounding hare racing off the page,
a half opened penknife (uncertain)
something that resembles a zinc bathtub
(where Cleopatra might have bubbled her silky length)
Look, a three legged table
(somehow bent on wobble despite its lathe-turned legs)
a lazy bench for musing in the park
(watching a lizard slither and nibble fresh air)
All these, encased by red comic strip
bubbles (of thought, inspiration, exasperation)
all perplexed and jumbled, the product of
five centuries of quills and nibs
wandering across the pages, down the years
into bookstores and libraries
Come read me!
A rattle bag of poems
encased in turquoise and yellow cloth
Dare we pass them by
their muffled voices shouting,
dimming from a sheaf of pages
dare we wander off
along the shelves
go for a thriller instead?
We falter undecided, then
the picture on the cover wins us over
and, like skydivers, open the hatch
take a deep breath
and plunge
into ten thousand whirling words
THE OLD COMPOSER
with grateful acknowledgment to Harvest International
His compositions were a series of serrations
dim figures, a row of poplars toothcombed
across the dusky horizon of his fading years
for as the evening breeze began its chilly chant
the truth was he could remember little of them
they were all slipping away now
into the haze of approaching night
Was that a bird call, a dove, an owl perhaps?
a phrase from a violin solo, an oboe trill?
or the wind calling its children through the branches
but wait, there was a melody, was there not?
perhaps he would develop it one day…
SANDALWOOD AFTERSHAVE
with grateful acknowledgment to Literati Magazine
You’re listening for a masculine chant
a familiar deep vibration, a tremor in your earth
a shoulder blade; the glow and hiss of peat, fragrant smoke in the grate
a skier carving a white slash in the snow above the glacier
a warm hand to gently massage Tea Tree Temptations
along the curve of your spine
erasing the tattoos in a new fresh neroli and grapeseed sweep of joy
misting your eyes into a tabula rasa of sweet open jasmine space
floating between the nebulae and the crackle of the logs
shooting prickles of shivery starbursts everywhere
Something dependable, like winter in the Rockies
shooting the rapids, laughing in the icy sun
a candlelit chuckle shared over a glass of Beaujolais
fingertip messages on the tablecloth bidding
swift urgent departures to other white billowy places
sandalwood aftershave and clean strong fingers
muted humor, quiet, wry and special
Someone to drink your wine from the grapes of your year’s harvest
savor your bouquet not as a connoisseur but as a true wild Bacchus
inhale your secret phrases, your crazy fragrances
and take you on his soaring white steed
to probe the furthest infinities
delve the shimmering glooms of the depths
ride the universe shouting at the stars.
KING OF JAZZ
with grateful acknowledgment to Literati Magazine
Smiling he sits alone at the piano
cigarette burning in an ashtray
composing toothpaste blues
honky tonk sasparilla solos
cool clarinet cascades
Evening news snaps on
the tea lady clinks her cups
birds chatter to each other
rustle to their nests
a dog barks in the distance
but he, alone in his house of deafness
hears nothing but the music of his mind
Caught in the wonder of the mood
he hears her voice again
sees her flying skirts
the seventy-eight girl
spinning between bass man and guitar
both hands holding the mike like a lover
she throws a throaty hello to the crowd
Now he is dancing with her again
crouched over keyboard, his fingers
thrust softly into the sound, the blues drift out
linking him, her and the crowd
in a dusky cloud of notes and cigarette smoke
Then the number ends
the crowd shouts for more
but he only hears the ghost of the seventy-eight girl
standing beside him
smelling of raspberry and wild fruit
spelling the notes into his pencil
onto the sheet, bar by blue bar
The cigarette burns itself out
the melody sits completed on the stand
smiles back at him
the seventy-eight girl wheels him back to bed
tucks him in, between the blankets
kisses his dark brow
turns off the light
and King of Jazz
slips smiling into paper dreams
AFTERNOON IN THE TOWNSHIP
with grateful acknowledgment to Literati Magazine
Wind the string tight
against the curving wood
ring after perfect ring
climbing from the strong pin
to just below the burnished shoulders
taking me back to Soweto
Grasp me tightly, paying
attention to the proper curl of
the fingers, the grip on the string
the deft confident throwing
and the quick snap back
to a playground
in a dusty township
bare black footprints in the earth
spinning me round, whirling grains of dust
aside in a miniature pirrouette of colors
Flicking stones into a sandy circle
others watch him from the corners
of their hungry eyes
watch him pocket me
walk to the station
twenty sinewy years later
board the train where the tsotsies
roam the swaying corridors
scanning for tell-tale bulges
my heart bulging and pounding
inside my coat
The gaudy newspaper
reported twenty years and
one uneventful day later
at the foot of a side column
on page three,
the previous days tally
of murders, muggings
thefts and rape
there’s nothing personal
about this brother
it’s all in an afternoon’s work
this time they got a colored top
to take home for the kids
THE FINAL VICTORY
with grateful acknowledgment to Literati Magazine
Writing unseen trails
morning skitters its fingernails
down the track of the peeling walls
hieroglyphics of recollection
snap on the clock-radio connection
which only hisses and crackles
quietly, its batteries running dry
as day three hundred and seventy-six
of an empty city sky
grazes the smog-free air
desolate and deserted as its predecessors
Somewhere in this empty gathering
of skyscrapers, lies a dusty clue
testifying to where it all began
fragments of a broken test-tube
that spread sticky fingers of death
across the city
across the fields
across the desert
across the seas
bringing choking retribution to vanquished
and victor alike
The clock hisses and stops
the final finger-pools of annihilation
spread and combine
as the membrane of history and achievement
shudders and dies
the brown sea of dust covers all
leaving no note, no explanation
to this Pyrrhic victory of self-hatred
save this one fading clue
written in dust
“brethren, the day is come”
GIANTS
with grateful acknowledgment to Literati Magazine
Giants leaving the bootprints of their thoughts
walk over my mind
prize winners in the gentle art of persuasion
they rip up forests of doubts
pave roads through the jungle of confusion
billboard the way subliminaly
But I’m not afraid of them
these are benevolent Giants
they anticipate my every whim
tell me what’s good for me to eat
instruct me how to avoid cultural litter
and environmental unfriendly thoughts
flatten out my fears
Converted and convinced
I’ve joined them
become a member of the Giant protection society
write articles about democratic values
economic theory
ten day diets
happiness and the quantum theory
I’ve given up my old freewheeling days
joined the Giant fan club
it’s so much more pleasant
to amble along carved out pedestrian paths
than to climb forbidding hills
And you know what?
I only had one bad chopping down
beanstalk dream this month
That’s pretty good
for an ex-sceptic
THE MACHZOR
with grateful acknowledgment to Poetica
The old Machzor sits on the shelf
its cover brown and gold unfondled now
three decades and some I’ve carried it
through changed addresses, seasons etched
across my brow
My birds have flown the nest yet still
the Machzor rests beside the book
from whence I sang Bar Mitzvah prayers
and now my son across the seas, repeats
its melodies, these same and ancient airs
And like a bird remembering its place of birth
the Machzor sings to him across the earth
How goodly are thy tents O Jacob
thy dwelling places Israel
AN EDUCATED POINT OF VIEW
with grateful acknowledgment to The Hypertexts
Down through history they march
the backward spellers
the number crunchers
the deja-vu specialists
the crystal ball peerers,
Tarot readers
coffee grind interpreters
star-chart starers
voyages from beyond
the boundaries of time
the gates of death
We laugh at them
a little nervously
we who know better
our time invested in rigid disciplines
hard-earned degrees
and all the decorations
that bedeck the gowns
and mortar-boards of academia
We peer into atoms
like bespectacled chameleons
and see only endless rows of mirrors
we delve into dictionaries
of prime numbers
unified field equations
big-bang theories
evolutionary hypotheses
crack the creator’s code
only to find further exceptions
that prove the rule
Then after the books are written and burned
after the microscopes are reluctantly put aside
after the week is spent polishing proofs
we shower
don fresh clothes
light candles
and holding our children’s hands firmly
we set off for synagogue
church or mosque
to chant our prayers
and make our requests
to an anonymous father
Would we but know
that there he sits
in his attic
throwing the dice
chasing the stars
and scratching his head
I AM DRY
with grateful acknowledgment to Other Voices
I am dry
dry as a seed in its remembrance
dry as a nun’s history
Dry as an old divorcee
so full of lost and found resentments
that he’s lost all his blood
I am dry
dry as an ancient tomb
dry as a miser’s fingers
parchment fading in its hidden womb
lost in a forgotten corner
I am dry
poems not relentless any more
leaves that drift down to a foreign heap
to empty bottles
to children crying in their sleep
to lovers turned mortal foes
to dreaming about the woes
the morrow may bring
Empty plates
broken cups
chocolate powder all spilled on the ground
grains of sweetness waiting to be found
and carried patiently
into ant’s granaries
only to be trampled by uncaring boots
I am dry
will it ever it rain again?
SELECTIVE EXTERMINATION
with grateful acknowledgment to Other Voices
Came home at ten
Opened the door
Ran to my den
Tripped over my cat on the floor
Turned on the light
Zzat, the bulb flashed and died
Groped to the computer
Which refused to come alive
Shit what’s next?
Oh fuck it, there’s a disk in the floppy drive
Pulled it out, pressed return
Nothing happened, oh sweet Jesus
Do these things happen just to tease us?
May those software bozos burn in hell
Please, please God, let my beauty be well
At last with a shudder and a whirr
The machine started up to my elation
The monitor lit and my eyes devoured her
My latest and greatest creation
If she had been deleted I would have cracked up
And killed myself for not having backed up
Muttering a few choice epithets
I finished off the final steps
Clicked the mouse, held my breath
As she sailed out to bring instant death
To a billion archives of hardcore photography
Websites for penis pills Viagra and pornography
Consigning them to extinction in a single blast
Sweet revenge was mine at last!
THE MUTANTS
with grateful acknowledgment to Other Voices
Out we sailed
so proud, so foolhardy
in our little craft all struts and girders
the future interestedly observed us
from behind one-way glass
We, heavy booted
descended the ladder
planted our drooping flag
in the unmoving dust
made our little declaration
so carefully prepared
so inaccurate
so inadequate
Behind their wall
they regarded us bleakly
as dangerous specimens
of a sick race
mutants
infected with fatal malignancy
unwelcome
Now here we stand
as the hands of an
old new millennium
sweep round
still dying
still unhumbled
doomed ants
still unaware
that we have been
rejected.
MANY VOICES
with grateful acknowledgment to Other Voices
She speaks with many voices; the daughter says
the voice of the wind in the crags of the cliffs
the voice of the water rippling with tadpoles
the voice of the mare groaning in birth
the voice of hay, of manure, of growing
the voice of our fields, our traditions
Yes, the mother says
softly combing her locks
listening with her eyes, her ears, her love,
she speaks with many voices
but all of the voices are She
BAT DREAMS
with grateful acknowledgment to Poetry Super Highway
We fly in dreams
and urge to roam
waken on tepid nights
when Christmas beetles
crawl, Cicadas sing
and vagrant bats
vanish and re-appear
between the shadows
of the mulberry leaves
and the diminishing eaves
of crouching rooftops
We soar into the
crescent moon
pale as a sleeping brook
draw lines of spangles
over empty highways
spread wings over continents
span silver wishes, drink time
like a white river
rushing to dawns end
How thin the membrane
that cuts thoughts
into what men think exists
and what bats sense
on their screens
a shimmering world of sound
and the ache to roam
oh the ache to roam
through the silken web
that ties the sky to the ground
And plunge helter-skelter
into a well of silence
like a black hole of knowing
roaming the byways
of a bat’s imagination
the most exquisite
freedom there is
DO NOT ERASE
with grateful acknowledgment to Poetry Super Highway
Together yet apart they waited at the station
Mummy’s boy and Daddy’s girl
so alike yet so different
the curds and whey of their sour milk childhood
indispensably separating them from us and each other
like the twin gleaming tracks of the
railroad leaping out to the future
parallel yet never meeting they carry their
genetic traffic to an undisclosed horizon
He, taller thinner more serious
a brush wash of male femininity
spectacles often threatening to slip off his nose
when wrinkled into that self conscious apology of a smile
she, fuller of figure and matronly
yet still brandishing her father’s brusqueness
Together yet apart they boarded the train
spotlighted amidst the cattle trucked bewildered mob
by our nostalgia and horror
we the survivors
watched them depart
eyes fixed on the monstrous closing doors
five years later, fifty, five hundred
praying that no ash of time would ever
erase their uniqueness, their fragile joys
WATCHING TRAINS
with grateful acknowledgment to Poetry Super Highway
A Swiss watch
opens itself curiously
going round
circles against circles
teeth against each other
an almost silent
encyclopedia of dance
in little bites,
little bites
rings inside rings
like a toyshop,
a train passing a siding
again and again
and a small body
glued to carpet
elbows propping chin
counting the seconds
in hundreds
hundreds and thousands
until closing time
pulled him away