If I Could

If I could, I would tear the earth from its axis
And spin it clockwise

If I could, I would make the barren winter field
Bloom again

If I could, I would set the sands of time
Waltzing up through the hourglass neck

Make the swans, and the peacocks and the gulls
Dance in reverse

Command the rain to rise, the sea to give up her dead
And the desert to flower

Watch the Nile flow back to the mountains
While the wind sings your name

If I could, I would tell every creature
Of your beauty and your love

If I could, I would steal the biggest diamond
And give it to a beggar

All this I would do for you

If I could

And I will

In my way

Odyssey

We sat and looked out over the ocean
The birds screamed at nothing in particular
And the dark rhythm of your soul
Enchanted me more than the deep

When you’ve been on the run
It’s good to come home
To something unexpected
New yet timeless in its truth

As if we had conjured the tides themselves
To our secret bidding
Mackerel shimmer
Fleeting glimpse of clarity

I like that you don’t speak of love
Or hope, or fate or future
But just dive into desire’s liquid caress
And live for the day

Ride the tide with me for a while
Sit out a storm or two
No promises at all
Let the horizon guide us

In Orbit

Flat on my back, far-off midnight chimes
Beech wood standing sentinel as the cosmos unfolds
Fire flare frames the celestial stage
Celadon and honeydew
Velveteen and stars

In vulpine silence now
Guarding my breath like a card-sharp’s hand
Eyes settling complex treaties with the dark

I wait

Still

Stock still, now

Trees aligned with planets, clusters
Quasars, blazars, dark matter
Nebulae, black holes
Stardust

Then, with glacial sweep
It starts

The hunter leads the way
His hounds and sword
Glide their course
With the twins and the bear
Stately in their wake

While in the wood
Long unheard sounds appear
The wind whispers its secrets
And bird, beast and insect
Call, murmur and hum

In the moonless hours

So there I repose
Spinning and star-struck
Bathing in gravity’s caress
As the earth herself breathes




Credo

What am I trying to reconcile?
The old gods or the void?
Sky blue days or lightning flash?
I cannot say

Maybe it’s not for me to know
Just a murmur of the truth
A fleeting dimming in the corner of the eye

Close it and what appears?

A cube
And again
A flame
And one more time
A nebula

Insubstantial guides all

And as for truth?
I’ll leave that to sages and priestesses

Magpie

Shall I adhere
To the singular vision
The way of the fanatic
The road of faith?

Blinkered yet certain
Sheltered yet safe
Cozy and snug
Behind a glorious silken curtain

I cannot
No longer wish I could
See the point

The worth
For others

Let’s face it
I am a magpie
Not a hawk

Fascinated
Curious
Chaotic
Alive

I want to know it all
Though I never can
Want to see it all
Though I never will

Want to be mesmerised
By life’s bottle tops
Shiny insignificant ephemera
Of existence

And never have to
Face the pain of truth




In Exile

Here I sit
In exile, as it were

No island’s palmy shore
No Parisian garret room
No wistful glances from a bridge
Or the rare cache of books

Listless melancholy’s more my style
Bookbound and bereft

I should have never let you onto my island
Never exchanged kisses
Or the deepest secrets of all

Nor unfolded all
Laid myself out
Inviting you to strike

That limitless yesterday is gone
The horizons move in

And from my kettle
I can only watch

Stunned and struggling
Like the new-caught fish
On an island’s lonely strand


Revelation

So there was something behind the arras after all
But it has taken so long to see it

Let it resolve onto the retina
Precise as a diagnosis

So now you have to learn to live with it
This daub, this caricature with a wit of its own
Which watches you far longer

Than you will ever watch it

Stone age painters used fire
To bring their prey to life
And stood, slack-jawed, as they danced
On the cave wall by the light of a sacred flame

But don’t go burning the flat down
Let it grow
Nurture this, your long-hidden familiar
Companion to a solitary life

Mask

There is flour dust in those lungs
Tear ducts strained
Pregnant with the fear
And priceless fluff
Deep in the tobacco-sanctified pockets

Courage-clad
Mined from who-can-say-where?

But this carapace of dignity
This semblance of calm
Is brittle indeed

Wet the paper-thin surface
Reveal the pulp beneath
Jellied blood and nerve
The bombed-out realm
Of a man who has seen too much

A cipher man
Living a cipher life
Anchored to a war which was never his
Lied to by his betters
He survives, just survives

A man
Self-contained
Freed from illusions
He locks up behind him
And heads home through the dusk

On The Mountain

Bivouacked a hair’s breadth
Below the summit of our desires
A taxonomy of distaste

Crossed your pretty lips

Chilled through to the bone
And suffocating
We only had one another to cling to
To get out of that forsaken place
In one piece

Mutual contempt our only
Source of warmth

Stepping away from the abyss
Cloud covered
The valley of our fears
Cling to the rock face
Or leap into the void?

Strangely enough, we did both




Child

Bundled there
In cosy swaddled peace
Milk-soused and sleepy
At low tide

But the waves and hurricanoes
That beached you here
Full joy of the maternal sun
Are not yet of you
Though they are in you

Where will the tides
And tempests drive you?
Which siren calls will you answer?

All will be revealed in time

And time
Your lover
Will also be
Your doom

There’s no shaking your destiny
But what a journey

Colours and sounds
Star showers and silence

Passions, hatreds, follies and fights
Art and music, talk and drink
Books and bears and bannisters and bats
Games, poems, seashells, flowers

A one-way trip
No guidebook needed
A free ride
The ride of your life