Poetry
Three poems
Atmosphere
I can’t wish on stars in unseasonal cold.
They’re older than they look.
And they keep shtum in shivery night
even when I sneak up on them.
Still they spread a stern and spiky glow
on my uneven thinking about
how things turned out, horizon
to horizon, birth to dust.
All that dust is real, it floats eternally
and there you are or will be, or perhaps
you were, flickering from atmosphere
to atmosphere.
You don’t have to say a word
and, of course, you can’t.
I pretend the birds do that for you.
I pretend the stars effervesce
or mean something like a portent
when all I look at is the past while
trees are still busy, and the late traffic.
You’re going somewhere too.
Fate is a Virus
how my hair has fallen
over the world of my feet, over
splatter, my pallor, my loves, my cheek
I hunger for undergrowth, unsaved junk
mudflats, alarmed confessions, rain as a ghost feast
it doesn’t hate you necessarily
the streets in the suburb are everlooping
funkish form fumbles on a twirl, a shame shag
even dogs speak in bitcoin whack
modern ecstasies sling round the supermarket
from cha-cha palace to bitch slap
online dalliance slopes over conspiracies
wish bent leaning into forever wherever
the stars went
The Ruins
Poems are separated by wind
planets tally matter a thin coat
the ruins the door you go through
The loads on a long walk accumulate
kerbs full of produce and refuse
no modesty about what was once inside
A poem marshals silence on vacant lots
a rusty chair burnt records corpses stones
trading or saving what can be brought
to our speaking faces
This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on December 5, 2020 as "Three poems".
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