Tag: speculum

Ever River Prime time, swallowed whole Could the universe, just once Have poured itself into a molecule So that, thereafter, Nothing could flow?   Never to suckle a broken circuit For sparking life; Never split by caesarean pangs Of primal punctures.   Black hole never thinned to liquid Boiling mud foundation pustules Turning all to gas.   All words now […]

The Musician’s Testament “Being a living legend is such a precarious livelihood. What a ducking of responsibility!” (John Cale) “Success means being worried about everything else except money” (Johnny Cash) I’m putting down this last eyewitness account leading up to zero hour because all the registers have gone into the red; everything’s going to blow. If I am stopped in […]

Immortality You carried your vengeance beyond decease – Slowed down the pyre’s cleansing, Slowed down the soil’s, the water’s warmth, Left total body change open to the senses – Pursued your cause beyond its effects, Stepped out beyond all examples, Further than all reflections, Forestalled all worth – All kindred, all common links –   Seeking to frame a cleansing, […]

Fast Lane Let’s get in the fast lane – Rip off the doors and slice the breezes; Let’s get in the fast lane – Thread the highway through a needle.   We can loop the date-line In a coral reef-knot; Turn our jet-lag inside out, Inverted, oblique, reversed.   Let’s fly an exploding plane, Turn on our parachutes – Chrysanthemums […]

Ritual Roots Trains: Stringing, ringing, lifting, Breathing meringues, with pores distended at the termini   Contraction is needed for piercing of bars And holing of tickets.   The breaking of one deadlock only Institutes another, more firm, In the hand and in the basket.   More futile by far than any old bird’s weak flight Through a Church, a hall […]

Complacency You had the world eat from your hand And thought you had it made To fade into your fantasies.   Nobody came to put you down, And so you never rose; You smiled and sang in blindness And your wine glass sweetly flattered you.   Supremely bored, And worshipping the needs that passed you by You paused, to consult […]

Alchemist Sing, earth-captured starlight Purest light to touch the earth Purest light to flow through day and night To flood our sense-zone; Sing through my blinking tubes and phials, All potions, never poured; Yet all suffused in afterthought. My litmus-jewels, made one by burning faces, turning suns, That charred the fixed eye, the rooted touch. Bodies I gel, not cruelly […]

Antarctic Depths   An ice-roofed stratosphere, clear liquid space And nerve-legged spiders Crack fans of anchor ice To mend all seals   Here it is coddled by the final killer, Will it be toppled by comfort’s rays?    

Growth Before Buildings   Wood piles beneath the shallow permanent stone Firm feet upon the yielding bog Let water in – the wood’s grain will prevail through its lines Let water out – white softness will grow to draw things down   The foundations could be called organic, So people longed to analyse          to scrutinize   Trade silver mercury Sweep […]

Nocturne   Small specks at night Made light of all our thoughts Which grew, in wonder, And burned the flesh that knew them And found the first thoughts, the controlled desires, the boxed fires the thrusting shields.   And spoke behind the pauses, And thought between the brain-tissues, And swarmed through infinite cells, And crowded out the millions And burned […]