there is no shade
or grade
of clay
that should ever be counted
as more valuable,
more worthy of the attention
of learned men
than actually
making
a
vase.
there is no shade
or grade
of clay
that should ever be counted
as more valuable,
more worthy of the attention
of learned men
than actually
making
a
vase.
but I can’t
help my-
self
I’ve been reading a lot
about thieves
and now I think
every ‘Christmas’
I’ll dress up as Saint Nicholas
(that is
I’ll dress up as a
very beneficent
shadow;
that’s all I
am)
but I can’t
help my-
self
I’ve been reading a lot
about thieves
fashioning myself out of
the precision and flash of Mickey Bricks
the concern and subtlety of Nate Ford
grifters are my missionaries
but I can’t
help my-
self
would that shepherds
would tend to their flocks
would that wolves
would eat grass
so we did what we could,
so we did the impossible,
we stole abstracts, for
would that wolves
were shepherds
but I can’t
help my-
self
notice, by the way,
that the best of them are still
just like us,
greedy,
wanting for themselves -
‘let’s take the spoils
and stop being Robin Hoods,
some of us like
to eat, y’know’
(what does Saint Nicholas
get for Christmas?) -
and I learn from that too,
because sometimes
I want to steal
a smile,
a kiss,
a love,
and I tell myself
to focus on giving people
the peace of mind
they’ve lost,
and it works
for a bit
but I can’t
help my-
self…
sometimes i feel like
a gospel song
is just a love song
to a broken man
whose distrust of your affection
runs so deep
that you have to serenade him in the square
just for him to love you back.
there’s this smell
that reminds me constantly of
one Sunday in my childhood
when I watched the Aladdin TV series
and then that reminds me
of a game our grandmother made us play
where if we did all our chores all week
we’d win a bag of chocolates on Sunday
(our grandmother was a wise woman)
and I’d do all mine
because I loved to wash dishes, I was grand at it,
and I loved to sweep floors, I was horrible at it,
and I loved trying to get my mother’s attention, and it never happened,
but my grandmother
would kiss me on the cheek
and pat me on the head
and say ‘Here,’
and I’d sit at the TV
and watch The Book of Virtues that Sunday
and eat every single
drop of sugar I had won.
I’m not saying all this because
that smell wafted past me
on a walk to the corner store
or while I was reading a book.
I’m saying all this because
anything that has a memory with Grandmother in it
is something I miss
as badly as I do her
kissing me on the cheek and
patting me on the head and
saying, ‘Here,
have a reward for
being you’.
Nobility is
wanting a shot of Irish whisky really badly
but just paying for the smell.
just a sip’s enough,
pouring into me like hot light
and tormenting every inch of me
in ways I could
more than get used to being tormented.
just a sip’s enough
to be ablaze for hours;
just a sip’s enough
for me to feel pleased
and yet still thirsty;
just a sip’s enough
to scramble all my thoughts
til my addled mind could only
imagine the sensation
of one sip more.
a.
(he said)
I would make a hot cup
of whatever flavour of tea I liked
for someone who simply reaffirmed
my own braggadocio
or wore a cape against my own insecurities.
Choke if you think
it’s funny -
I deserve to be placated
even if it’s at the cost
of the peace
of the Pez dispenser
that gives me that love I want.
b.
(I said)
I take issue with the fact that
someone should love me when
I don’t think I like things people love.
I think things people
are intrigued by,
scribble in notes of quirks
or write tweets about
but not things
people smile about.
They told me I wasn’t lovely
and I trusted their opinion
They told me they didn’t want to talk about it any longer
then They told me they wished I wasn’t so hesitant to talk
then They told me they wished I got it
I don’t get it
They told me I never really loved anyone
because how could he really love anyone
when he’s afraid to ask people
to feel the same way about his fears
as he does about theirs?
They still tell me
I should talk more.
I tell them
__ ____ ________ _______, ___ ___’_ ____ ______
__ __ _______.
c.
(_ ____)
Sometimes I wonder
what an afternoon would feel like
if I could wake up in that afternoon’s morning
and just rest all of me on a plate,
wrapped in cellophane and
sealed with a kiss;
what the cold would feel like
if I could get warm in you;
what my regular silences would translate to
if I could give you a dictionary and
some of my typical rested phrases
and ask you to give it a shot.
Sometimes I
build living rooms
in my fingers’ valleys
and spend lonely moments
in their corners
with the fireplace’s critical tongue
lashing the air in front of me.
Don’t lie, though,
I need to be reminded that
I am a man whose
thoughts you are resistant to,
or that will be an in
and I will con you out of all your calm,
take off in an unmarked carriage
and dance in all their golden splendour.
Let me know
I should stay silent,
I should not say things
that spook you,
I should not say things
that cut you off
when you feel like you’re drowning
or your lungs are full
or your lungs are cut out.
I will hear that -
trust me, I will hear
that song I’ve grown up on.
I may not hear much else.
That isn’t grand, I know,
but even when I try to learn another
this is the melody I know,
veiling truth because
They do not think I can hit that note very well.
I know -
‘I’m not them,’ you cry.
But you’re a chorister.
You give me the song sheet
and ask me to follow
from one idea to the next
past breve asides and quavering resolution.
I don’t know the song.
I only know its rests.
Yes. I understand.
The Great Commission
makes heretics of the silent.
Unfortunately for you,
so does the revolution.
your mother slept under rust
to keep you safe
and slept upon rust
to keep you safer
you don’t tell anyone about that.
the laws of physics
are often out of the control of unstoppable forces
and the policies of sociology
are often out of the control of immovable proletariat
you don’t tell anyone about that.
some things are granted
some things are taken
some things granted are taken
some things, granted,
are granted
some things are taken for granted
you don’t tell anyone about that.
some times you can’t find the fuse
in time
so you blow up in a kind of secret
you don’t tell anyone about that
(they’ll figure that last part out,
you think,
but you’d think we’d figure out the first few things
in their order
like we’re supposed to).
listen,
this is how people are multifaceted:
they ask for you because they would like to see you.
they don’t because
they would like to see something or someone else or
they’re currently in the throes of distraction or the pangs of distraction or
sleep has burrowed into the eye sockets or
they can’t help you or
you can’t help them or
this is about something entirely different than
you,
maybe even entirely different than
them;
when you say
“I get that you’re upset, but
can’t you get that I’m more upset now than you can be?”
you’re really just sanding the fulcrum
that you want so badly to be able
not to slide off the bars of,
so maybe
use your inside voice
when you’re disobeying your rules?
replace your mirrors with
an ebony sculpture that reads
‘people are
like I am.
people want things
like I do -
not at the same time,
not in the same doses,
not in the same shapes.
no one’s done me wrong
by being just like I am to me.
they are not villains
for disliking my favourite green tea
or jumping low when I jump high,
because, above all else, they try.’
the hard battle is
that sometimes people throw
as much as you punch, or
punch as much as
you kick.
learn something new
or perish;
learn that people know
something else
or perish alone.
and for the love of the game,
maybe a spectator doesn’t know
your dedication to it all
but sometimes
spectators have score cards,
sometimes
spectators are themselves disgraced players,
and at the very least
don’t stop in the middle of a play
to shout.
prove him wrong
or take his notes.
you used to be an announcer yourself.
break your mirrors quick,
or you won’t see enough about you.
when you want really badly
to tell a secret:
‘hey, you,
i’ve fancied you before
and in between the still winds of your silence
for months and months
i’ve forgotten what it felt like to fancy you
til your voice rang again, rich and clear,
and i’ve fancied you again;
forgive me,
feeling noticed tastes so sweet
and i crave it when i become reacquainted,
i think,
i think,
i think i love you now
and that’s bizarre -
i’ve never loved you before,
i may only suddenly love you again,
and you will never love anything like me
before or since
for your own good.’
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do
I want to talk to you
about how your hair smells like sea water
and your nails are still wet with
the wants of days so old
I don’t know what your face looked like
between those hours and now
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do
I want to talk to you
about how your eyes find places to rest
upon the disgraces of me,
about how the plains and valleys of my chest
are not nice places to be
and the chasms and cavities of my dreams
swallow images of my past,
faces, voices,
even the bubbling magma of other
people’s distrust of me
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do
I want to talk to you
about where my hands go on evenings
and what they do there,
about why I haven’t written you a letter
every night, like you wish you wanted,
not regretting them at all;
you’d regret them all,
if only you could know what those letters would have said,
if only I had written the bloody things
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do
I want to talk to you
about how I don’t get why
you know I’m a parasite
and yet won’t ever peel me off your skin
and squeeze your fingernails into
my silent, sinning self
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do
I want to talk to you
about why you think my mewing
means nothing
and about wanting to possess but not wanting to be possessed
and about how we run from questions
we still want answers to
and about longing
but still staying short
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do
I want to talk to you
about the landscape of my dreams
and what two o’clock means
and what hope looks like
after it notices that you’ve been staring it in the dark
for an hour and a half
and it’s clearly lost hide-and-seek by now
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do
I want to talk to you
about wanting to talk to you
I want to talk to you
but we don’t know what to say
and we don’t know what to do.
1.
I get it.
Denial is perhaps the only faith you know,
if there existed a patron saint of indulgences
you’d build a shrine of blades and bottles;
I’ve come to tell you
yes
Buddha is more Dagwood than you can imagine
there is more to be enjoyed
than your ascetic surrender can fathom
and you will never fathom it,
sir,
until you start sinking your teeth into it all.
2.
You are indeed
in the company of fools.
I used to sing this song
far more often and far earlier
than you ever learnt the words
so don’t think you’re being noble or clever
to be in the dining room
swaying to
can I make you fall in love
with me?
can I make you fall in love
with me?
We’ll see
trust me,
there are pages and princesses who
wish I’d stop singing the song myself
who can at least recall
moments when I’ve hummed something different;
maybe take your lyre
somewhere else,
and your tall-tale-tellers too.
3.
I may not know enough about
the stars, and may not know
enough chambermaids who can be arsed to hear me out,
but I know this:
Durga can be my dance partner,
she needn’t much wooing;
the wind can bear my breath as child,
she needn’t much doing;
whenever I’m aware that I’m star-things,
I needn’t much glowing,
and any word of good or bad,
they needn’t much sowing,
so all I need is my drink
and my meal
and a wink from something that fancies a drink and a meal of me,
all I need is my pencil
and a dead tree,
all I need is
what all I need of me,
all I need is
to know I’ve not been hurting anyone lately,
and if your faith is
to hurt someone into loving you
then you’re no man
cut out for any cloth I think is worthy.
If I see any harp of yours,
I’ll beat you silly with it
and string you up
above stakes with their guts.