I RUSHED BACK TOWARDS THE MORNING

This is a personal poem, based on a dream. It is for my late first wife. That's all I'm saying.

POEM FOR CHRISTINE

I dreamt of you last night.

We were living in some far city,

I had something to do with the university

where Leonard Cohen was going to give a reading

in the lecture space atop the library,

all very informal.

There were the usual barriers that dreams put up

to ensure they are as complex as life

but the sun shone and the people had enough to eat.

Anyway when I arrived he had begun.

Thinking back on it now I am awake,

I can see he was a collage

composed of the dozen or so times I saw him,

morphing from a younger man in the 70s,

to the old man who never stopped touring

and back again in the space of a poem.

Though I was close enough I couldn’t ask a question

or get him to sign the copy of Selected Poems

that had appeared in my hands.

He was there and then gone

and you never arrived.

As the world carried on I waited

until they locked the building.

The sun had set the night was warm

and our children came to collect me.

I thought of you somewhere in that city

as I rushed back towards morning.

It's a sad poem, but I think there is hope as well. 

This was one of Christine's favourite songs.

Until next time.

NEW LIVES IN HEAVEN

He's something straight out of my head. Probably the idea developed after listening to Judee Sill [and if you haven't listened to her, then you really should]. Enchanted Sky Machines floats the idea that flying saucers [or whatever they are called these days] will come and save the faithful.

WAITING FOR THE SAUCERS

Before dawn we were on the hill

singing hymns of celebration

confirmation this was the day

we would transcend

to our promised new lives in Heaven

The drizzle did not dampen

the gawkers and cameras did not make us falter

that came later in the full light of day

wet to the skin cold to the bone

perhaps Salvation did not beckon that February day

Conscious of my weak chest

my Mother was the first to question

in twos and threes we walked away

turned back to our earth lives

I have never felt as alive as I did on that hill

I'm rather fascinated by cults, the idea that some old white man [and they usually are] can tell others how to live is weird to say the least, but when they announce the end of the world is neigh, then they need sectioning. The best line Bob Dylan ever came up with was: don't follow leaders, watch your parking meters- enough said.  

Here is the magnificent Ms Sill. If you get a chance to watch the recent documentary then take it.

Until next time.  

SPRY THREE MINUTE MINITURES

Do you believe in reincarnation? I do. I am certain we have been here before and we shall be here again. Today's poem asks what happens if one out of a karmic bond arrives on the planet much earlier than their soul mate?

REINCARNATION BLUES

It was lucky that we had the gramophone,

separated as we were by time,

and you could leave me messages

in the canyon spirals of shellac discs,

cunningly wrought as they were from insect resin.

Eventually I happened upon them

in fire sales of bankrupt stock.

Then with a growing fascination,

in the backrooms of second hand shops

that litter the fading ports this side of the warming sea.

You described your love for me

in the words of Tin Pan Alley tunes,

spry three minute miniatures that chronicle

the moves of smiling men who could never be me,

and the heartbreak from their treachery.

You see I arrived too late though not by choice.

You had jumped impulsively from the Bardo

as the drop zone came into sight.

I hesitated. Too late I followed.

Half the globe away your siren songs had long been sung.

You were gone decades ago

and now I have the hands of an old man

with a face that almost matches.

This time around we got out of step.

Mistiming, loneliness are the lessons we lived this life to learn.

The idea came when I was listening to some 78 rpm discs. I thought could you use old records to contact your true love in the future? Rather like the music David Bowie makes in The Man Who Fell To Earth to explain why his character cannot return. I'm not sure that's made explicit in the film but it is in the book.

I suppose I'd better go with some of the man's music.

Until next time.

THERE HAD BEEN AN OUTBREAK OF POETRY

Here's a villanelle, a dreaded villanelle. You have to have a certain degree of skill to pull them off.

IT COULD BE CATCHING

There had been an outbreak of poetry

thankfully it was only a villanelle.

The symptoms were a moody intensity,

giving his life an ABA frequency.

He was quarantined in a cheap hotel.

There had been an outbreak of poetry

and his choice of rhyme revealed uncertainty,

he was unsure if they worked that well.

The symptoms were a moody intensity

to which the nurses responded with flattery,

how he longed to get out of his cell.

There had been an outbreak of poetry

how long it would last none could tell.

The symptoms were a moody intensity

to which they suggested psychiatry

as his rhyming scheme was shot to hell.

I'll let you decide if I have. I got the first line then spent some time making it work. 

Here's the late, great and unjustly obscure Laurie Styvers. Some of us have been listening to her since the early 70s. 

Until next time.

MY SECOND CYCLE OF WAITING

A poem from my fifth collection- The Wait of Water, if you would like a copy contact me. It's based on a fad of the 1800's, the public unwrapping of Egyptian mummies. I know you would think the great and good of Paris and London would have found something better to do with their spare time. But apparently not...

THE UNWRAPPING PARTY- Paris 1891

when I lay on my back not one day dead

having my brain extracted through my nose

while my guts were pulled out by the handful

and dumped into the jars at my feet

I did not foresee that my sleep would be disturbed

by anyone less than a God

I could even put up with the French interrupting my twilight

but to be labelled a minor figure

in the political structure of the Lower Kingdom

while accurate could have been phrased with more respect

this social event at which I

am the reluctant centre piece

makes no pretence at science which has come to replace religion

for these shallow individuals who do not know their own place in the cosmos

I am simply a sideshow that allows the good matrons of Paris to gasp in awe

as their high priest professor holds aloft each wrapping

as if he was revealing a universal truth

such enlightenment is beyond the banality of his words

which reveal more the shortcomings of his time than my life

afterwards I am consigned to lie under glass naked

having seen too much and in my second cycle of waiting

be ignored by the passers-by making their way to the gift shop

As I say it's all true, yet another example of the colonial mindset that has given us this world we live in. Better days are coming.

And a herald of those better days is the song Resilience by the wonderous Annabelle Chvostek.

Until next time. 

JUST LIKE THAT

This poem was composed about a year ago and is about one of those psychedelic moments in your life that just take you and offer an unexpected view of the world.

MOMENT

just like that the champagne went flat

we were in the presence of a bigger mystery

one that would carry us to a place of metaphor

and consume a whole twelve hours

we had been there before and would visit again

so I watched as the bubbles fled from the pale liquid

sometimes all you can do is trust

and watch the seconds as they uniquely unravel 

Nothing at all else to say about it, save to wish you many moments of wonder.

As we're talking psychedelia here's the Edgar Broughton Band with Hotel Room.

Until next time. 

LOVE POEM

 

Here's another old poem, it comes from my fourth collection All Yesterday's Tomorrows, from 2018. It was written in response to a request from my sister-in-law for a poem to celebrate her 25th wedding anniversary.

LOVE POEM

On the roof of the garage,

opposite my bedroom window,

from out of an abandoned sandbag,

I watched two poppies

explode into blood red beauty.

Love can erupt anywhere,

and if we are blessed it will stay.

It may not be easy, the soil too thin,

the sun and rain cappricious,

but love will find a way.

What I think works well in this poem is that it takes a well known symbol and instead of linking it to war and suffering celebrates love. This month I'm posting everyday to give the blog some weight.

Here's Anna Ternheim, with Summer Rain.

Until next time.