Monday 29 September 2008

American sentence

I had never heard of the American sentence until I read Poefrika, which directed me here. I am not sure if I understand the concept fully, but the 17 syllable aspect is easy enough to achieve:


It is so quiet now that loneliness sees through all my disguises.

Thursday 25 September 2008

Seasons of home:


               Spring

 The mountain glows gold
with the smoky promise of
      a blossoming fire.

Seasons of home:


              Summer

      The sun melts fallen
ice-cream into clouds of blurred
     abandoned rainbows.

Wednesday 24 September 2008

Seasons of home:


           Autumn

  Time to clear the grime
and put to sleep an era’s
    faded pantomime.

Seasons of home:

             
                Winter

     Mid-phrase a bullet
snaps him from the bitter air
  to the dead, cold ground.


Tuesday 23 September 2008

Thank you Eskom


Yesterday
Your razor eyes peeled back
my carrot skin disguise
Exposing things long tucked away
By mouldy familiarity.
And I, cold and raw, x-rayed you
And I too saw.

We tiptoed a fine-spun thread,
teetering on edges of ugliness,
Eyeing depths that offer no return
that plunge to parallel dimensions
without intersection.

I stiffened, poised to leap
into the icy winds of love’s defection,
into the slipstream of the left-unsaid,
but then the lights winked out
and we
well we did something else instead.

Monday 22 September 2008

Sent to Coventry



Coventry, oh Coventry
Your name does strange things to me
with its round-vowelled lilting beauty
It brings to mind scones and tea
and Morris dancing and all that is Englishy
(and a naked woman on a horse but this poem is not meant to be kinky)
Your name is silky, Coventry.

Coventry, you lie to me
When I visit you all that I see
are concrete blocks and faded humanity
Your bus station is full of knives, needles and debauchery
and the people are always bothering me,
what IS that metal bridge monstrosity?
Your name should be Slough or Wrexham, Coventry

Saturday 20 September 2008

TV removal men

I know that "men in the night" sound
and I know the fear, the heart in the mouth,
the hand on the phone, whispering my mantra
Take what you want, the TV is crap though,
you already took the good one, that one is someone's spare,
The picture is blurred and jumps around,
Just don't hurt us, we are not bad people.

Now I am over the sea,
and I think of my loved ones
and I whisper again,
please please do not hurt them
they are good people.

And ps, thank you for curing me of TV.

?

My head feels worn
with too much thought
or too little, and torn
between fear of success
and failure safely borne.

Nothingness is easier than you think-
but slipping through the cracks,
hiding from mediocrity,
is only to sink.

Little people

If you feel you are too small
for this world, like a hobbit
amongst giants towering tall
Think of faithful Sam
And Bilbo who stole a cup
from a sleeping dragon,
But not so much Frodo -
he was pretty fucked up.

Lost

I am not of this earth
I am not of this space
I am designed for another time
and place

I encapsulate longing
for a sense of belonging
for a way to fit, a way to find
home.

Thoughtbite 2

The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain.

The rain in England falls daily on the rain

from yesterday.


*

Thoughtbite 1

My, the world is a bit of a screwed up place

We're all running around trying to save face

putting a shine to the tarnished human race

wehaveourheadsupourbuttsmostofthetimebutwe'reallrightreally.