feedback would make me eternally grateful...
poems
prattling ignorance
natural stupidity
talking about
artificial intelligence
What know you?
Why dabble you?
When there is nothing
behind painted lips?
fluff up the pillow
razz up the class
painted lips mellow
Why dabble you?
In magic you cannot do?
Elvish piper drums and all
Sing a merry tune withal
Step and turn
Mead and wine
Dance a beat
Yours and mine
Elvish pixie fluttering fair
Twittering twirl in the air
Hover and leap
Cups of dew
Send a kiss
For me and you
Elvish gnome stout and dour
Stomp heavy the iron’d tower
Heave and ho
Foam ale and show
Give us a wave
And take a bow
Elvish King and Lady Queen
Heavy crown and eyes so keen
Have no part in glittering Ball,
But stand upright at castle’s walls
Elves make merry down below
As dark black clouds in distance blow
Piper pipes and Handsmaid calls
But King and Queen are held in thrall.
Elvish piper scream, not shout
Parched throat bloodred drought
Slash and burn
Wail and cry
Dance no tunes
But sleep and die.
Elvish pixie ravaged sore
Tattered wings and no-man’s whore
Limp and crawl
Mute and mine
Hang your name
With starlit twine
Elvish gnome cut shorter still
‘paled atop old iron’d sill
Reave and blow
Foam blood and snow
Pain and woe
From no-man’s bow
Beheaded King and Riven Queen
Melted slag and muted scream
Played their part in kingdom’s fall
Broken like their castle wall
Elves lie burning down below
As ashen river still merrily flows
Piper’s gore and Handmaid’s flesh
Wrap King and Queen in no-man’s rest.
I make my way from door to door
Silent, alone I roam
House and castle mean naught to me
For the stars were ever my Home.
I dream of lights and the spaces ‘tween
Asleep I hear their song
And I ache for a ship, to sail away
To the stars where I belong.
Yearning forever I wander apart
Through the years that pass too slow
But one day I shall head out alone
To the stars of which I know
Keep your cities, their twinkling lights
And love that blinds the eyes
Guttering candles can be no match
For my stars that burn the skies.
He woke up in the dark. Something was wrong…different. He lit the only lamp in the room and looked around. He felt, more than saw, the thin trail of smoke, winding up from the crack under the door. Beads of sweat laced his forehead, whether from fear or the heat, one couldn’t tell. There were no fire drills then, so he reacted on instinct, rushing to the door and pulling it open. The heat hit him like a blast from a furnace, and the smoke rushed in, acrid and blinding. He heard a thudding. Thud-thud-thud – the sound of a heartbeat that wavers in uncertain fear as lungs are deprived of breath. Eyes watering, gasping for breath, he made his way out the door. Sudden piercing shafts of pain obliterated all coherent voice, and a howl of anguish rent the night. The flames licked at his feet, their orange tongues hungry for his blood.
When you hear or read about terror, you think it comes full force to devour you. No. It forms slowly in the pit of your stomach, coursing up your spine till you are not capable of thinking of anything save the terror. They say that in war, there is no enemy but the War itself. But how can you fight against an enemy so primeval that god himself takes second stand?
The flames had reached the walls of his room and were making their way inwards, turning everything in their path to black cinders. There was no way out, nowhere to turn, though his fear-racked mind could not, would not know that. He slammed against the burning walls like a caged animal, aflame with desire. Thud – thud – thud; this time it was the sound of a body hitting wood. After a while the thudding ceased. He gave up. The flames danced merrily, and he succumbed to their seductive peace. Terror howled, dwindling, and fled down a path frozen by the north wind. A few flashes of warmth flared, deep inside, as he tried to flail weakly against the ice. Thud-thud-thud stuttered the last beats of a mind that no longer had a Name. He who was, was not.
What I would give for maturity not-gained.
Oh, what I would give for innocence.
For the lives I have lived since ten
To be forgotten like mists on wind.
Dimly, I remember a time,
When Father Christmas was only a world away,
Fondly, I remember myself,
Believing I came from a cabbage patch
A time when I read Hans Christian Anderson,
And my parents could do no wrong.
All that is gone on the river of time,
And the bridge is broken in the moonlight.
Fools think wisdom belongs to gray bearded men
"Wisdom comes with maturity," says my friend.
No. True wisdom comes in knowing what I have lost
Oh, what I would give to trade it away.
So here I sit, sampling pleasures of flesh,
And I read 'Inferno' by Dante.
Oh, what I would give to throw it away,
My life, for sweet, blessed innocence
Oh, what a grey tangle our dreams have made
Of dancing bears and harpsichords
Of youthful lovers amidst tender sheets
And tinkling china that never got to break.
What we had we dreamt away
And squandered knights like pittance
And as eyes grow dim, memories brighter burn
For all grey years we had thought we lived.
The knitted yarns were never used
Our dreams played havoc like kittens
Our youth came, touched us and left
Sorrier that we never even knew.
Beyond that sunlit pasture
Beyond those black dappled hills
I have been told there lies an ocean
The likes that none have seen.
They say it lies a scant two days ride
Down the dusty road that passes through the middle of town.
But I, a village lout
who has never strayed beyond calling distance
can never dream of that azure gem.
The sounds of the sea are in my heart and my pounding gaze
The corals chime weakly to the sound of my flute
But I must herd my father's cows
And be watchful lest they stray
Beauty is the arrow that pierces your breast
in a store window that went quickly by
a plastic angel dressed all in white
that made my parched eyes weep.
Beauty is that young man at the bus-stop
that peers out through a pane of graffiti
dressed smartly, a hobbit in his hand.
Beauty is that flickering warmth
seen through a third floor window and warm curtains
a peal of laughter in a glorious soapy opera
that reminded me to be lonely
Beauty is that I cannot touch but see
Borne away on shimmering wings
for the bus has come, and it is bedtime.
And I watch through the thick lenses in a black plastic frame.
Wretched eloquence
that wraps me in swaddling cloth
thoughts that float
in dreaming slumber
damned to prose
chained to
beauty
of fantastical imagination
I demand damages
I demand to belong
but wretched eloquence
won't let me conform.
Wretched eloquence
that cradles me in words
thoughts that dream of shining excess
words that cannot damage redress.
Writers are eloquent failures
Fuelled by dark, deep desires
That we laugh off as “story”
Pretending
That what we dreamed to become
Is not a make-believe character named Frank.
We made money
Spun success like cotton
But nobody handed us a sword
Nor did we ever steal a degas
In black jumpsuits
Suspended
Over three inch lasers.
And so we are doomed to dream
And so we live reality
Through...Frank.
I am the dark, the obscene
That you forgot while you sleep.
I am the blood pooling behind in craters
I am the heat that lost its way.
I am the sacred, the obscure
That will expire in savage glory.
I am the empty unbearable
I am the kind that cannot pray
I am the cut, a taste
Of a mongrel caught in her web
I am a diamond tear
I am a broken door ripped astray
I am a feather, a heart
You lost before today.
I am ivory teeth tearing through joy
I am a bell ringing without repair
I am a pendulum of possibility
Possibility and despair.
