click on link for text message poem...
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
Thursday, June 14, 2012
before a parade is staged
by jeremy davies
‘I’m Botswana,’ he says,
shows me a coloured-in flag
pasted to a stick.
‘Do you know where that is?’
He nods,
his ocean eyes omnipotent,
bottom lip confidently bit.
The parent in me asks:
‘So where?’
And the answer is so supremely right
that nothing else from that time
on could ever do it injury.
‘It’s in room three.’
‘Of course!’
Wet with my shadow,
he cocks his head,
gifts me with a grin,
and says: ‘What’s funny?’
Saturday, February 25, 2012
literary agent
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Madrid
Every night the moon is full.
Buildings, broad-shouldered, are canyon-cutting
up through the stone and earth:
they know themselves
and the monuments, with sky in their eyes,
ignore me, looking ever down:
there is blood beneath the cobblestones
that hearts still move about.
You smell food in the light,
cigarettes in the dark,
and the difference is gentle,
like the breeze in November.
Sweet Henry,
sweet Ricardo,
dream me into city dreams
amongst the beating boom of living lusting rock
Here,
to catch your breath
is to put it in a jar,
seal it up
and start to build a pathway.
Madrid is breathing me,
in and out and in
to the streets, in
to the open-shuttered bedroom
warm as hand-held brass.
Life is a city, this city,
so heavily human,
so full
so unlike empty meadows, flowers and fields
that know nothing.
Buildings, broad-shouldered, are canyon-cutting
up through the stone and earth:
they know themselves
and the monuments, with sky in their eyes,
ignore me, looking ever down:
there is blood beneath the cobblestones
that hearts still move about.
You smell food in the light,
cigarettes in the dark,
and the difference is gentle,
like the breeze in November.
Sweet Henry,
sweet Ricardo,
dream me into city dreams
amongst the beating boom of living lusting rock
Here,
to catch your breath
is to put it in a jar,
seal it up
and start to build a pathway.
Madrid is breathing me,
in and out and in
to the streets, in
to the open-shuttered bedroom
warm as hand-held brass.
Life is a city, this city,
so heavily human,
so full
so unlike empty meadows, flowers and fields
that know nothing.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
my favourite limerick
A young silly limerick-mad runt
For rude rhyming words he did hunt
For drum, breaux and brie
He found bum, poo and wee
But nothing else sig-nif-ee-cunt.
For rude rhyming words he did hunt
For drum, breaux and brie
He found bum, poo and wee
But nothing else sig-nif-ee-cunt.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
The Heroic
A change of pace - a piece from 'goliath.tmp: a memoir', with thanks to Alexander Pope
The Turncoat Prince
Ambivalence! Too oft the state of man
Who nobly strives, but ne’er entirely can
Encapsulate the spirit of his time
In dusty pamphlets, deeds of sale or rhyme.
What follows then? A moral tale of old
Which came to me within a dream so bold
It did so seem that I was there, I say,
Just as, just here, I clearly seem this day.
The Good Book’s land it seem’d to be, and though
So much was gain’d, so little’s to bestow.
In righteous vengeance regicide was done:
A bloody giant on a mountain won
The day, but in descent from there he glimps’d
Ascending thus, in haste, a turncoat prince.
They lov’d each other once, but then betrayed:
The giant had his heart through hate re-made.
His sword, still wet with blood, still keen to kill
Sang lusty songs of veng’ance and its thrill
And yet, despite the hate that burned so bright
Inside his faithful breast, he ran from sight
In faith the giant hid, but faith misplaced:
So giant he, far less the land embraced!
More body was unhid than hid. Of course
The turncoat Prince prepared himself for force.
Approaching though, his thoughts did twirl anew:
With thoughts came words, with words a plot soon grew:
‘Alive, a giant as an ally is
far more politic to my cause, and his.’
So, thus, as he approached with guile, he hailed:
‘O giant knight of old, my friend, please tell
me why, in open ambush, bold you wait;
Your lust for royal blood is yet to sate?
Come now, remember? We were once in love!
Let other men have hawks. For us? A dove.’
The giant stayed in place, concealed he thought,
Still bent on murder, though on less resort.
But then, the Prince drew forth a weapon sharp:
For what will soothe the savage beast? A harp.
For soothing is a death of sorts, you see;
Sans rage, the turncoat’s victim turns to me
And whispers: ‘Yea, though Beauty be no beast
And Splendour be no fool, O God, at least
This sound loves me! And ev’ry beast’s a fool
Who cannot hear their doom in Beauty’s rule!
The turncoat Prince, a David of the Jews,
In the giant the love of Spring imbues:
The daffodils, the violets and the rose,
The dancing lamb, the babbling brook: all foes!
So easy do the lovely turn their coats
When Princes use their cunning: sheep to goats.
Emerges he, our hero giant’s frame,
And dances, smiles, and sings: so quick, so tame.
But now, with me, he shakes with rage a’new
To see himself, en’storied, falsely true.
‘Lie down,’ the Prince he croons, ‘beside this brook
The water’s clear, the stones so smooth, and look!
Just there! A doe doth drink her fill, so sweet!
Such beauty, yea, so tender, and such meat!’
So swift the Prince picked up a stone and cast:
Fair beauty into beautiful repast.
The giant Knight saw not a thing struck down
His bread and circus head upon the ground
His bag of bloody royal heads forgot
Empty of who or where or why or what.
For princes or for philistines, what next?
This giant fallen in this field of text?
Which coat to wear, when ev’ry coat is worn
concurrently by ev’ry man who’s born?
The turncoat Prince observes the offer’d head
Decapitation? Worse: a kiss instead.
The giant’s weapon stolen thus and used
Against the vase where flower’d thought abus’d.
Less bloody, true, less bones left in the grass
The coat sown up with threaded pain, aghast.
But still, the giant hears the Prince descend
So left with bitter idyll to contend
The bag of royal heads across his back
The psalmic Prince sings to the bloody sack:
‘False fields! False fields! How can you be so true?
Weapons of war so fallen with the dew!
If I can stop the dew and rain with words
The mighty thus are fallen for the birds.
O Jonathan, the Prince of just one coat:
Your head is so much heavier to tote!
And as for old King Saul I must agree
That such a merrie old soul was he.’
And see, the giant’s tale to me runs short:
The swiftness of our loss brooks no retort.
The Prince, a giant-killer did become,
From strength to strength and coat to coat he spun
The giant grew e’er larger as he shrank
The more he striv’d, more perfectly he sank
Until he all but disappeared from view,
Save troubl’d voices, hereby troubling you.
The Turncoat Prince
Ambivalence! Too oft the state of man
Who nobly strives, but ne’er entirely can
Encapsulate the spirit of his time
In dusty pamphlets, deeds of sale or rhyme.
What follows then? A moral tale of old
Which came to me within a dream so bold
It did so seem that I was there, I say,
Just as, just here, I clearly seem this day.
The Good Book’s land it seem’d to be, and though
So much was gain’d, so little’s to bestow.
In righteous vengeance regicide was done:
A bloody giant on a mountain won
The day, but in descent from there he glimps’d
Ascending thus, in haste, a turncoat prince.
They lov’d each other once, but then betrayed:
The giant had his heart through hate re-made.
His sword, still wet with blood, still keen to kill
Sang lusty songs of veng’ance and its thrill
And yet, despite the hate that burned so bright
Inside his faithful breast, he ran from sight
In faith the giant hid, but faith misplaced:
So giant he, far less the land embraced!
More body was unhid than hid. Of course
The turncoat Prince prepared himself for force.
Approaching though, his thoughts did twirl anew:
With thoughts came words, with words a plot soon grew:
‘Alive, a giant as an ally is
far more politic to my cause, and his.’
So, thus, as he approached with guile, he hailed:
‘O giant knight of old, my friend, please tell
me why, in open ambush, bold you wait;
Your lust for royal blood is yet to sate?
Come now, remember? We were once in love!
Let other men have hawks. For us? A dove.’
The giant stayed in place, concealed he thought,
Still bent on murder, though on less resort.
But then, the Prince drew forth a weapon sharp:
For what will soothe the savage beast? A harp.
For soothing is a death of sorts, you see;
Sans rage, the turncoat’s victim turns to me
And whispers: ‘Yea, though Beauty be no beast
And Splendour be no fool, O God, at least
This sound loves me! And ev’ry beast’s a fool
Who cannot hear their doom in Beauty’s rule!
The turncoat Prince, a David of the Jews,
In the giant the love of Spring imbues:
The daffodils, the violets and the rose,
The dancing lamb, the babbling brook: all foes!
So easy do the lovely turn their coats
When Princes use their cunning: sheep to goats.
Emerges he, our hero giant’s frame,
And dances, smiles, and sings: so quick, so tame.
But now, with me, he shakes with rage a’new
To see himself, en’storied, falsely true.
‘Lie down,’ the Prince he croons, ‘beside this brook
The water’s clear, the stones so smooth, and look!
Just there! A doe doth drink her fill, so sweet!
Such beauty, yea, so tender, and such meat!’
So swift the Prince picked up a stone and cast:
Fair beauty into beautiful repast.
The giant Knight saw not a thing struck down
His bread and circus head upon the ground
His bag of bloody royal heads forgot
Empty of who or where or why or what.
For princes or for philistines, what next?
This giant fallen in this field of text?
Which coat to wear, when ev’ry coat is worn
concurrently by ev’ry man who’s born?
The turncoat Prince observes the offer’d head
Decapitation? Worse: a kiss instead.
The giant’s weapon stolen thus and used
Against the vase where flower’d thought abus’d.
Less bloody, true, less bones left in the grass
The coat sown up with threaded pain, aghast.
But still, the giant hears the Prince descend
So left with bitter idyll to contend
The bag of royal heads across his back
The psalmic Prince sings to the bloody sack:
‘False fields! False fields! How can you be so true?
Weapons of war so fallen with the dew!
If I can stop the dew and rain with words
The mighty thus are fallen for the birds.
O Jonathan, the Prince of just one coat:
Your head is so much heavier to tote!
And as for old King Saul I must agree
That such a merrie old soul was he.’
And see, the giant’s tale to me runs short:
The swiftness of our loss brooks no retort.
The Prince, a giant-killer did become,
From strength to strength and coat to coat he spun
The giant grew e’er larger as he shrank
The more he striv’d, more perfectly he sank
Until he all but disappeared from view,
Save troubl’d voices, hereby troubling you.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
post the launch
Had a very interesting time experiencing the 60+ crowd that showed up for the new gallery launch, and getting a feel for the whole process, as bizarre, in its own way, as any other process; though, perhaps you expect (unfairly?) a little more from an institution that is involved in something called 'art'.
Plenty of characters and strange hangers-on - myself included. Have quite a bit of work happening based upon it - and related issues - the following two pieces are the closest to being viewable in their formative state.
art aureaucrat
A man who'se after his own heart
he waits for lecturing to start.
Grey dreadlocks, muted greens and browns:
artistic chic on him abounds:
The primitive, the tribal look:
an iphone under fingers put.
(Technology's an open book.)
In gallery he has a stage.
The people the unwilling page
To take direction from his mouth,
like birds delayed in heading south
We learn what's now, what's then, what's best
He is the proof: no more, no less.
(The question is the answer, yes?)
But wait a while upon his words
See how they form, see how they herd,
Particu'ly from he enthralled
Who—piss so high against the wall—
then points and shouts and says: 'Hey! See!
My culture's best, so says me!'
(But always, wind-assisted, he.)
poet in the house
Rouse! Rouse!
indigenous mouse
there be a poet,
in the house
There a panic
(a naughty word)
what might he say?
what have they heard?
look, he's gotta haiku
look, he's got a pen
I'm sure I saw a villanelle.
was that a sonnet, then?
So,
I called
my local politician
but she was out of the office
at the moment.
the last they'd heard from her
she'd fallen down a bottomless hole to everywhere
in the middle of a topless building estate centre-left to nowhere
and they couldn't find the right form
anyway.
could I call back?
I called my lawyer
and got his voicemail from Tahiti.
it made my ear wet
and my mouth dry
I called the police
they told me it was a domestic dispute
so fffffffffffffffffffffuck off
I called my therapist
and she said it was all in my head
take those skittles I gave you last year
NOT THE RED ONES
lie down, think of the impermanence of the soul
then dance on the head of a needle full of smack
I hung up and ignored her completely.
though that didn't work either.
I called the television station
and I was put on hold for exactly the next three eternities and three quarters
I missed the next evolutionary leap
the return of Christ
and over four million new iThings
though I did learn all about the coming summer line up
from a woman's voice who sounded like a porn star's real lesbian-lover
good news: I enjoy sitcoms
I called an exterminator
and he came for a call-out fee of $666
(including goods and services tax)
but all of his chemicals dried up
each time he crossed the threshold
he bought a sandwich and left
I spat in it
I called the local mafia
but they were scared of giving the game away
besides, they were to busy watching Sopranos
(reruns coming this summer)
then I called the poetry council
and BANG they shot him dead
since that worked better on stage
and, they told me—tapping their nose
to show their fearlessness in the face of cliché—
for the aesthetic energy of its
narrative denouement
and with his dying words, the poet was
forced to agree
with both them,
and me.
we got the bastard just in time
before he played around with theme,
shifted open verse to rhyme
and really truly fucked our scene
but he's still in the house,
indigenous mouse,
how do I get him
Rouse? Rouse? Rouse?
Plenty of characters and strange hangers-on - myself included. Have quite a bit of work happening based upon it - and related issues - the following two pieces are the closest to being viewable in their formative state.
art aureaucrat
A man who'se after his own heart
he waits for lecturing to start.
Grey dreadlocks, muted greens and browns:
artistic chic on him abounds:
The primitive, the tribal look:
an iphone under fingers put.
(Technology's an open book.)
In gallery he has a stage.
The people the unwilling page
To take direction from his mouth,
like birds delayed in heading south
We learn what's now, what's then, what's best
He is the proof: no more, no less.
(The question is the answer, yes?)
But wait a while upon his words
See how they form, see how they herd,
Particu'ly from he enthralled
Who—piss so high against the wall—
then points and shouts and says: 'Hey! See!
My culture's best, so says me!'
(But always, wind-assisted, he.)
poet in the house
Rouse! Rouse!
indigenous mouse
there be a poet,
in the house
There a panic
(a naughty word)
what might he say?
what have they heard?
look, he's gotta haiku
look, he's got a pen
I'm sure I saw a villanelle.
was that a sonnet, then?
So,
I called
my local politician
but she was out of the office
at the moment.
the last they'd heard from her
she'd fallen down a bottomless hole to everywhere
in the middle of a topless building estate centre-left to nowhere
and they couldn't find the right form
anyway.
could I call back?
I called my lawyer
and got his voicemail from Tahiti.
it made my ear wet
and my mouth dry
I called the police
they told me it was a domestic dispute
so fffffffffffffffffffffuck off
I called my therapist
and she said it was all in my head
take those skittles I gave you last year
NOT THE RED ONES
lie down, think of the impermanence of the soul
then dance on the head of a needle full of smack
I hung up and ignored her completely.
though that didn't work either.
I called the television station
and I was put on hold for exactly the next three eternities and three quarters
I missed the next evolutionary leap
the return of Christ
and over four million new iThings
though I did learn all about the coming summer line up
from a woman's voice who sounded like a porn star's real lesbian-lover
good news: I enjoy sitcoms
I called an exterminator
and he came for a call-out fee of $666
(including goods and services tax)
but all of his chemicals dried up
each time he crossed the threshold
he bought a sandwich and left
I spat in it
I called the local mafia
but they were scared of giving the game away
besides, they were to busy watching Sopranos
(reruns coming this summer)
then I called the poetry council
and BANG they shot him dead
since that worked better on stage
and, they told me—tapping their nose
to show their fearlessness in the face of cliché—
for the aesthetic energy of its
narrative denouement
and with his dying words, the poet was
forced to agree
with both them,
and me.
we got the bastard just in time
before he played around with theme,
shifted open verse to rhyme
and really truly fucked our scene
but he's still in the house,
indigenous mouse,
how do I get him
Rouse? Rouse? Rouse?
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