Under the Skin
Would I fain not peel these subterfuges
Neatly, like a banana’s yellow shell
Off these your eyes locked in a forced slumber?
Cut out in neat slicelings the refuges
Of the autophagous guilts that compel
You to stillness? Not gracefully sunder
You from its throes? But would I not then find
A curved white column as closed and obscure
That would promptly break into three, unbind,
Expose its threads of rot, then be no more?
X-Ray Eyes
From wind-nudges we seek sanctuary
Like the tall aspens of song and legend,
Like September leaves clinging to the tree,
Like ashen shells of broken-eggs-to-be.
Wind and Water, Fire and Earth,
Build us waiflings a shield and hearth!
From gazes that bore flinchlessly without end
Upward, coreward into cringing skies
That to fear-sogged lead baleful glares rend,
We flee, crawl to the grey shadows to mend.
Wind and Water, Fire and Earth,
Build us waiflings a shield and hearth!
From eyes that deem flesh and skin warping lies,
Immovable as stones pierce through to see
The bare soul-truth that unswaddled in ruth dies,
We fly, and howl in faux bereft-wolf cries.
Wind and Water, Fire and Earth,
Build us waiflings a shield and hearth!
Just Human Things
You can’t be happy the bees are dying
Even though they sting not in self-defence
Like other insects, but with viciousness
And purpose almost human. You commence
By glaring at the news, long to erase
The grinning bee-coloured sun pointed west,
That fuel of life that dips its head and says
‘Remember me, earthling? Yes, I sting too
But you pray for me to go on shining.’
Nature is laughing up her moonlit sleeve:
‘You can’t be happy the bees are dying
Because you’re human. You know you must grieve.’
Quavering at Fate
The shoe rolls into a wavering row
These six worn red balls sprawling on the pitch
Waiting for the old man’s square drives to throw
Each one into the net with a skill which
Quavers at fate a full kettle of rage
The clouds, grass, birds, planes, flowers are all zoomed
Out of eyes bent upon this one fiddle;
In the trembling strands of the nylon-cage
Glints the stark hurt of a being born doomed
To live laugh love greatly and win little