Stone

Hard as ribs to the touch,

quartz veins curve

on its surface. Erosion

has settled shape that cannot

be split at a pulse.

The crush coheres,

hollows the flesh of my hand

where blood flow slows

to an ache. It fits my palm

as though it were born there,

skin-stretcher, smoothed by

the wash of a distant sea.

Sure in its heft, it endures

the evolution of fingers,

the continuation of bone.

St Anthony’s Chapel

 


Ruins close in

as you reach the arch,

blocking its hold

to the upper wall.

You nod at the prospect

of suburbs and river.

“Not the best view,” you say.

“Not worth the effort.”

Watched swans plunge

to the loch below,

a concord of flight

in their search for food

as we track back

the way we have come.

The path tips to a gully,

mud slips under my feet

In the Shadows

All day the solstice wore grey:

we withdraw to the deep night

where bone drops from bone

into the cooling places.

Food falls from our hands. Straw.

Life has not lived at this table

since the sprung god died,

grapes turned blood on his tongue.

Stripped for the pit all these years,

we suffer a scourge in each raw cut,

the void a smell in every festering.

There is no help in us.

We crumble on bedrock,

do not greet the disordered dark,

nor feed the god descending

 from our crooked stars.

DC, be Aryan

 

Z is for Zeitgeist, when shit flies around

and calls for the trumpets of doom start to sound.

Y’s yapping for Yalta. Oops, sorry, wrong war!

Someone’s forgotten we’ve been here before.

X exacts Xeno – the ‘phobe’ will come later,

supported by dubious dossiers and data.

W’s with Weapons we’re certain are hidden

in mousehole and mosque, graveyard and midden.

V values the Virtues our military build.

How many body bags do you want filled?

U upturns Umm Qasr, the first town we’ll take

and we’ll take and we’ll take, when our honour’s at stake.

T trickles to Tony, pet poodle and friend,

who, pissing on Parliament, holds up your end.

S slams on Shock, so, alongside of awe,

Baghdadis will cop it. Add them to the score.

R rankles Republican – Party and Guard;

one party’s arranged for the guard to be charred.

Q’s quaking Qatar, so let’s draft an order

to engage friendly fire as we cross Iraq’s border.

P procures Powell and Israeli Power.

As the latter bawls, “Increase!” the former will cower.

O oodles with Oil, so rich and yet thick.

No, Georgie, don’t swig it, that’s crude! You’ll be sick.

N nudges up Numbers in collateral damage.                   

Civilians or soldiers? Women or cabbage?

M masses for Mission. Er, what is its name?

A Storm in a Desert?  No, sshhh, Desert Shame.

L’s lovely in Looting for dealers who lie

about shipping fine arts to New York, on the sly.

K kindles the Kurds re-taking Kirkuk.

We’ll make sure the Turks’ll bring them to book.

J judders with Journalists, many embedded,

though a few independents will likely get shredded.

I implodes in Iran, the next on the list -

another sad nation that’s got Dubya pissed.

H hankers in Hans, the Swede with a plan

to locate phoney weapons - whenever he can!

G grovels to George. What a prize for his nation!

His election, we argue, was no aberration.

F falls to Fedayeen far in the East.

Did the CIA order a moveable feast?

E’s the Élite, which we are; yes, it’s true,

and sandstorms are wet and intelligence new.

D drops on Daisies, cutters and all: 

we won’t let Shi’as keep more than one ball.

C cringes for Children like Ali, disarmed:  

we’ve sent out prostheses; the media’s charmed.

B bloats in Basra, where Brits reign secure,

no matter that cholera streams from the sewer.

A might have been Allah, but Allah’s a boor;

it’s His fault Iraqis pumped up this war.

Glastonbury Thorn

The tree’s in leaf and neat

where the robin sings

a lure close under thorns

while day ghosts by stones

cold as myth, clumped

in the yew tree’s shade

as grass falls down

a field by the Tor

where wind flicks

edges of haze;

in blurred time

each bough breaks white,

branches thicken

snow and the dead  

behind my eyes.

You are drawn

by the bird’s bright call.

Opium Days

Everywhere I look, poppies.

Ssshh, here the children are quiet.

Fields of them fade into mountains,

their hushed graves. A bloom of bombs

and you wear one over your heart.

Two months on, with each one marked,

God in the burst, red over the hills

and up through Europe, sleep

where you slept for a century:

today you buy dreams on the street.