The Economy of Poetry

Its hard to say something new
in a land
where cliches are a dime a dozen

Its hard to be brief
when work once begun
compels exertion

Its a land
where seed is sown
nurtured, grown
where the heartfest
is threshed, pounded
mulled over, digested
till the motion is moved
that the product's approved

Its a land
where the whiff of a word
is not worth a scent
where fragments of thought
and keen observations
are coined by obsessive compulsives

Its a land littered
with the broken hearted, dreamers
ecstatics, romantics
and the multi level marketeers
reaching deep in their pockets
to retrieve
microscopically important localities
and to flash their native lingo currency
for all to see, and admire.
Yet none in this land do complain
where the driven and driven
live out of each others pockets.

Oh
Its hard to say something new.
Oh
Its hard to be brief.

No Longer Moved By the News

I'm no longer moved by the news.
The protest chants of strident youth
the battle cries of long in tooth
expert pronouncements on environment and health
economists warnings for employment and wealth
murder, mayhem, crises, disaster
a heartwarming animal tale for after
oops no mention of the starving MILLIONS
whilst war in Iraq approaches the TRILLIONS

I'm not buying into the name.
My house is a home not a glossy magazine
my clothes have no label, I'm not part of a scene
I can cook and grow food in the ground
listen to music, create my own sound
I don't have to shout from the roof that I'm right
and tolerant enough that there's no need to fight
and, although this poem is a protest of sorts
I'm able to write and think my own thoughts

I'm equal you are different.
Though I'm peaceful I know I could kill
endanger my family I possibly will
if you've suffered misfortune, there's space on my floor
If your eyes say you're using I'll show you the door
Psychopath , molester, poor and the rich
angel and saint, wizard and witch
grower and dealer, straight and the queer
I've known them all, and the crosses they bear.

I'm not afraid of truth.
'Just telling the truth' is a game people play
to hurt, put down, or win their own way
deep in their heart they know its deception
and keep their honesty from their reflection
Its simple to be enlightened and true
just listen to the voice inside of you
so if indeed you pass this test
may you life be full and blessed.

Three Monarchs Hatched in a Storm

Three Poincare potentates with a strange attraction
Their Mandlebrot wings up, and out of action,
Their tropical cousins whorled wings flapped
and fluttered once, twice, thrice,
and winds whirled and waters rushed
as a cascade of bifurcations played
Born today and yet they stayed
in triangular rigidity, a trinity
of fractional dimensionality
The three wise men of Orions Belt
Feeling wind, the rain they smelt
The order that this chaos brings
The stilling of their royal wings.

A walk in the remnants of a cyclone.

The universe has never separated itself from man. Man separates himself from the universe." Lu Hsiang-shan (1139 - 1193) from Hsiang-shan Ch'uan-chi.

You may have seen me today.
I was the one walking in the wind and rain
without a coat, feet bare, smiling.
Smiling
Head held high in a windy cocoon,
thoughts stripped from my mind
and teased through my hair.
The first impertinent drop
quickened the high bone beneath my eye.
Upon arriving at the old speaker now dressed as a letterbox
feet spattered in gritty gravity defying rills
and hesitant beads establishing a trail
in the slack 'tween collar and back,
I was discharged from the custody
of my warm walled box
where I bide and abide
till the day I am died.

Today I was verily touched.
Touched
by old cold waters, sprung from the first
passed among the stars
and settled on Earth
Waters passed by Buddha and Christ
demons and dragons,dinosaurs, mice
toads and witches, queens and princes.

I could've driven to get the milk.

Telephone - Song lyrics 1985

I call you on the telephone
You're always out you're never home
Baby what're you doin tonight?
And every time you let it ring
You know I'm always wonderin
Baby what're you doin tonight?

Baby I know that you've got another guy
I can tell it by the way you hold my eye
Baby I know that you've got another man
I can tell it by the way you hold my hand..


Sung to incredibly cheesy finger picked guitar. Always intended to continue the song but somehow nothing I came up with ever worked. All ideas appreciated...

One - Song lyrics 1995

Can you see the light,
its shining
Can you see the fire,
its burning
Can you see what i see,
when you look deep in your heart,
and dont you know
we'll never be apart
Cos we're one
one of a kind
Yes we're one...

Johnny came from way
way on the other side
and when he got there
there was nowhere he could hide
when he saw you standing
standing in the light
He knew he'd never spend
another lonely night
n i g h t ...

And the night turns into the morning
sun shining in your hair
and all the troubles of the world just disappear
when I saw you standing
standing in the light
I knew I'd never spend another lonely night.

Can you see the light its shining
Can you see the fire its burning.....

J'accuse I

Literature is a vehicle of moral principles. Literary expressions are art and moral principles are substance. if one is earnest about substance, and writes it down with art, it will be beautiful and loved...Those who are engaged purely in literary expressions are vulgar people.
From T'ung-shu (Penetrating the Book of Changes) Chou Tun-I (1017-1073)

I accuse myself of
at times
wallowing in the broth and fubbles
of wordplay.

I have committed art
without depth
of suffering despair love
and emotion.

I have massageed my ego
in jets
of flotsam and intellect.
aqueous humour

I sentence myself
for pretence
and shrouding my feint soul
from revelation.

Not yet may I write the right
or lay claim to moral principle
to greater being supplicate
my beating heart be still.

Another Year

Forty three.
I have noticed, regardless of intent,
not much seems new
to me.
My daughter, twenty one months,
delights daily, nay hourly
in discovery.
Forty three.
Its a station nowhere. A pre-midlife mellow
wearing halcyon shields of securities illusions.
My setting foundations a little weathered,
I view youthful indiscretions
with just a peak over Conspirators Hill.
I suffer helpless desk attendants
with no power no responsibility no initiative.

I love it when Bryanna (twenty one of months)
visits upon me her unaffected affections
when Bradin (thirteen of weeks) of throaty laughs
peals away my hard found ernsthaftness.
Today
A heart shaped felt and fluorescent feathered card
guided glued and gifted by mother and daughter
A chocolate muffin with a Pooh candle
The first ever blown out by Bryanna
A handclapped chorus of happy birthday
Forty three
En famille
Multum in parvo

Ahhhhyymaaayyyyt

cleaning washing vacuuming the mind, changing the nappies of thought, smoking time away.
A tidy house is a tidy mind, fighting the forces of chaos in my domain is tiring. Order over time.
Put on a mixed lot of socks, yesterdays shirt until todays shower, burn wood. Chaos over order.
No thing never changes ... maybe death... Lifes great multicoloured threads wend thier weft.
... and unravel for all minds to move through, loosely, lost, finding, til we are parted. Endarkened.

Yacophony

The last time we all got together
was a real yacophony
The hubble bub of insights
and our mellowing wisdom
knives and forks stabbing through
the self-foolfoolling pats on the back
The rattle from chains of word
associations formed long ago
and unsung idealisms turned realisms
on the fattened yolks of broken ego shells

and the property boom didnt hurt either.

In response to On the Bench

So
The once proud lioness
who jumped through rings
and stood centrestage on the pedestal
at the carnival of earthly delights
who can no longer bear cubs
who displays her sagging vanities
who sharpens her long teeth
on the soft jellies of revenge
seen through the sleights of youth dimmed eyes
was shot
to put us all out of her misery.
Our misery.

To read "On the Bench" http://www.sleightmind.blogspot.com/

All that glisters... 1995

Acch, and lo, all heathens say hello
Aye, and sacrements to those below
wither thou spendeth free or ensnare
Twas beed the devil visiting there.
When the shining thru dark doom asunder
and glinst caught in thoust twinkling eye
the very first breath wasted on words
didst end the very golden shining.

And whom taught this false endeavours yet
so slowly that two truths contrary and true
rent time asunder whilst mind bewonder
and all and space betwixt and gone
Twas all the same. And you and i. And all.

Dis-illusioned By Atomic Anarchy. 1995

Sick of all the same game
Tired of being talked down to.
Man is god. Mother was fucked.
A rampage of no cares
Awhirl of ignorant bliss
A call for imbalance, stupor
Disillusioned by atomic anarchy.

Fuck convention. Fuck.

Fuck FuCk fUCK FUCK

Rip open the vagina again.
Granddad worked hard and died.
Grandma was really fucked.
Their atoms move apart.
Vomitous incesting primal atomic dance.
Satan loving god suckers
Spread eagled masturbatory chastity.
I scream the beat that isnt music
in unity take what isnt mine
I eat putrid sweet angel shit
Fart in your mouth
I ram nuclear weapons up nuns cunts
and taste the sweet oblivion......

Bob - the Bar. 1995

I walk the streets looking for a whore for free.
A suck for freedom, a suck for love, a suck for me.
I eat, talk cool, drink and shoot pool.

Lust for the lick of your depravity, for the flaring perfume
Pulsing velvet petals, warm, fertile, nourishing.
I want to muzzle, burrow and grow, deep inside.
Grow through you, become and be you, arise anew.

And then walk away. (You can come to)

Well Have You? 1995

Have you ever told your mother you wank?
Or how you do it?
The mother who bore you.

Have you ever kissed your father on the lips?
And told him you love him?
The father who bore you.

Have you ever ignored your god?
When you knew better?
The god who bore you.

Look at your shadow in the light.
Are you not the shadow
when the dark world descends?

Eeeewwwww

I was going to place a heap of poems here from the 70s and 80s, but you know how it goes... CRINGE. So no more. I'll put up a few from the mid 90s and from then on it'll just have to be stuff from this year on. (Umm just maybe I'll throw a few others up as the mood takes me) Any truely deviant personage who wishes to embarrass my being can apply in person for access to aforementioned "poems". Aaaah ha hah haaah aah.

Still Sedate -1980

Mellow murmurs
Drifting on the calm waters
Of an easy wind.

Subdued by a white mist
Soothing, soft
I waft above.

The honey sun
In harmony with
A field of golden wheat.

Come,
Hold my hand,
Enter my tranquility.

The War Domain

Another from 1980. I seem to remember feeling uneasy about the nuclear situation in the world and the possibility of being drafted for some senseless war. Anyway this was written after a walk through the war memorial museum in Auckland.

Wondering through the relic warehouse
I heard a heartbeat.
Yesterdays streets and stones,
over human bones, traversed.
Look not now what can't be seen;
Have you signed a name on the glory wall?