Poems

David Kirk

Pick a poesy tie your shoes your life is over


If you don¹t sell out
and chose to live with the beliefs n passions
you started out with
you have this hard fucking road to walk
because everyone around you
is pointing the devious extended hand of accusation
n saying
why are you still like that?
why aren¹t you rich?
with a big autonomous steel dream that moves faster than anyone
why aren¹t you walking the high street in sharpshooter wanker shoes
and shiny suits?
why are you still grovelling by the
celestial tides that¹s so passe man
living in that concrete honeycomb with the drones n workers
to and fro
and to and fro
and to and fro
I know


this godly design


i run my finger
with a musicians
touch of play
down the smooth
path
through the forbidden mountain pass
between your buttocks
to the place
where anus
and vaginal lips converge

this godly design

lost in loosened hair
and pure lust
brushing faces
like worshippers
we move
each other
toward the bedroom

Poem

In memory of Mary Allana


I truly believed that I understood
death

but how can you know?

how can you concede
something missing
that will never again
be incarnate?

the fled spirit
of your kindred
her body
no longer warm
with blood and laughter

or those wise and weary
Pronouncements
upon human folly
the bold dismissals
upon life and fate

the existential bleakness
the deep husky blues
no more

how can this be?

I watch the living,
putting petrol in their cars
and flitting about
on their firefly errands

Spinning around
the globe
of their daily affairs
not knowing
or caring
oblivious of your departure
I want them to halt
but they won¹t
I want them to shut up
to shut down
but they will not
their time is short


and I see it now ;
what the sages have been
trying to convey;

that
all human life is momentary
a brief radiance
before the hours
of this earthly sojourn
burn
away

all of it so dreadfully important
yet all so slight
in the face of eternity
to which we return

Lesson

My brother used to pin me down
on the ground
with his knees
on my shoulders
and my hands out crucified
after an arduous chase and battle

we¹d both be breathing
laboured breaths
heaving
and gasping for air
and he¹d say Œ do you give in?"
and I¹d be lying there totally done
and still I¹d say " No I don¹t give in."
and he¹d say " whattaya mean you don¹t give in?
"look at you, why can¹t you just accept
the fact that you have been defeated
by a superior warrior?"

humiliated and with nothing left
to draw on
I resorted
to spitting in his face
which disgusted him so much
that he whammed me in the nose
and blood began to flow
and I began to howl
hot tears streamed from my eyes
my nose was running
snot was well as blood
and he just abandoned me there
and got up and walked off

" Why can¹t you just accept it
when you¹re beaten? Maybe this time
you¹ll learn you lesson."
He continued forward
not looking back as he spoke.

Wrong turn

I set out to court the muses
and got the sirens instead
the faces singing tangled in the tidal weave
seduced me with the false promise of success
material wealth and artistic glory
but instead of raising me up to the gorgeous sun
they set my course for endless torment and delirium
down to the river Styx that I couldn¹t cross
without the sacred lucre

I wailed and swayed with the wraiths
in bars and dives of sweet profanity
drunk and stoned out of my mind forever
going insane with a leery smile so what the hell
and letting the whole damn world go to buggery


Hosanna

Stuck in the rain in traffic
in the darkening evening
in an old car barely holding together
with me barely holding together
it¹s the first of winter

it¹s been freezing
cold all day
bitterly so
I turn up my fragile radio
to the limit
before it reaches distortion
something choral by Handel
a gorgeous swell of strings and voices
a tribute to ancient royalty
a promenade of grace & magnificence
in a dirty world

outside
the rain arrows the running people
fearful as field mice
big nimbus clouds overhead

for a moment
I feel
something
close to glorious

Work Epic


at dawn the first engines are fired up
like the parade drums
of a lost war & ancient war

the rattling guts
of repetition

weary
and
pained
and
frightened

angry or bored
white faces
through misted glass
utter words
or smoke
or sing

or look sullenly forward
moving into
the terrible urban
light of a blasted world

into the thickening river
of freeway traffic
the daily migrations
of the working hoards
who inhabit the hollow matrix
of cities
and corporate towers

slavery
the price of security
and those
who choose
the silverfoil wings
of delusion
fall behind
smiling
like another kind of dead
oblivious of the need
for vast objects

for them
survival
necessitates
simplicities
each etches a place
in the larger scheme
worthy
as any
some though
lose the thread
and are cast
aside into ditches
with their syringes

some are wrapped in bruises
and stitches
fondle ethanol
to numb
the wounds
and losses
and
hallucinate

   rising to dawn curses
and broken matches
turning
to
the sun
a merciful angel

the gas hisses
and the kettles sing
the silverbullet trains
enter the underground
writhing
like insane worms

grey and blue
pigeons
coo
in the cathedrals
upper reaches
where gargoyles loll
with superphosphate
dreared
faces and
stony eyes


outside the cancer ward
the surgeon
paces
smoking his pipe

police line the tree¹d avenues
to keep the sniper

away from the prime minister
of China

smiling
behind
a mask
of  butterflies &
a parade of decoys

the ants are restless in Timor
but
there¹s no sign
of rain

the newspapers
are divided
for perusal
a tenuous map

a fragment of plans

for the swirling
streets of madness
for the
grit
   and
     error
   and irony

   the
   seamless
   conceit

   navyblue suave

   the stylish dance
   of high finance

       &
   the bums gold coin
   the haphazard
   luck
    of
    windy circumstance
   still
       miraculous
       in the face of it

   astonishing
   the way we endure

   the tedium
   that ensures
   our staples
   and keeps our table

   the human being
   of the
   advanced civilised
   mind
   burns
   relentlessly
   in a furnace
   of measured
   hours
   and intolerable
   predictability

   under the blazing sky
   of this
   beautiful, dangerous
   and unfathomable universe

   delighting in our grandiosity

      in the mess
   of our discovery

   our technological glory

   Tikal
   Palenque
   chitza nitza
   The Cheops
   teotequecan

   spectral cities
   worn by sand
   strangled by jungles
   fluted by cosmic winds
   poke tongues
   at the joke of it    



The Bricklayers children


five of them two boys three girls all young
it¹s schoolholidays
& he has taken them along to work
with him

the morning went great
but now in the afternoon
the novelty of being at dads work
has worn off

& they are getting difficult
bored & irritable
they cannot be satisfied with their toys
which they have piled on the footpath

aliens & monsters & the circuitry
of a plastic intergalactic civilisation
beside the miniature brick wall
they constructed
to emulate their father

now it¹s full-  on sibling in-fighting
the bricklayer is constantly
being interrupted from his work
he strides over
to have a word to them
and sort things out

then no sooner is he back on the job
than there is another outbreak
and he strides back yet again

you can see that he would normally
lose his temper
and bellow at them
but is holding it together
under the eyes of his workmates
who are
quietly amused
by the whole affair

with the big man so vulnerable
his gaze is profound
standing there
hands on his hips

wondering what the hell
he is going
to do

the sky is so enormous
the vastness of this life
incomprehensible



Sonnet

   for Lucinda


   How swiftly the season of spring arrives
   after the eternity of winter
   Once sparkt the secret seed contrives
   below the frozen ground as the sunstar
            enters
   The dainty jonquil from its sleep unfurls
   and thaws this icy heart of aching dread
   the trees  hoist up their green & blowing sails
           & the same swift force brings the tulip blood
   Puts sweet hex upon the bees and flowers
   signatures with gold the fledglings wings
   wets the blessed earth with mild showers
   & all that once was sullen now its sings

   How swiftly does this turning turn again
   The ease that comes will leave, so too the pain

Father


outside the rain pelting
andthe ambulances
wailing

   utterly shagged and sleepless
I struggled to comfort
the infant
also wailing

feeling like my mind was beginning to whirl
out of its orbit
I was losing my grip
when finally in the far-gone a.m.
he fell asleep

2 days old‹
I stood over the lace draped crib
as the ivy over the walls outside shivered
and the taxis bloodred tail-lights
bobbed in the torrents of stormstrewn activity

the taxis honked
and still the baby slept on
lost in a rapture

and sweetpeace reigned
in the aftermath of a desperate birth
hours upon hours
like murder

and slowly the daylight came
and the crib glowed with an eerie
Phosphorescence
the whole room bloomed like moonfire
and the baby's mother snored
and a blue rabbit and a blue bear
and a pixie and a mouse and a lion
held court
from the windowsill
as I rubbed my eyes
and sighed in the presence of god

Spell


lying together

the wind in the high branches
in the trees outside the window

like the voice of god
like the sound of the void

it is Sunday and this is our holy communion
no sex
no argument
no garments
no psychological entanglements

simply sleeping together

we may stir
we may touch
or brush each other
or murmur

but mostly we remain in silence
in the wintry thrall
of this deep
spell