Rain patting down the heavy sheets of night,
morse code messages interrupting sleep, tiny womb-beats gurgling peacefully so that I'm delighted to be awake, to drift back to the before-birth darkness we die into. Shored up in places of plywood and concrete it’s easy to find falling water pleasurable, to think that this is an ancient melody of childhood chatter and drips of dreams, a free meditative muttering from lost gods. But perhaps our ancestors, shivering in caves or cramped up behind smoky walls of sloppily daubed mud, hated the damp music, cursed the tinkering sky deities, praying for the morning, sun, dryness. Published in Windfall, Spring 2017. USA:
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The following pieces were published in the Peacock Journal during March 2017. 'Swallowtails' was re-published in July 2017 as part of the Peacock Journal Print Anthology 2.
Swallowtails As big as hummingbirds, they seem to struggle with the light winds, or perhaps applaud with their hand-clapping black-rimmed yellow wings and false-swallow point – no swallow is ever threatened by these beautiful drunk butterflies, staggering from flower to flower, tipsy on nectar. They try to reach trees, inspired by the birds but always drop back to the flowers, sails outstretched for lazy gliding. For a few seconds a sniggering pair wobbles around each other, dancing over the decking, deliciously confused and spiralling higher, back towards the birds. Second thoughts. Wrestled back from the ambitious air, they drop down and flutter their own paths back to the flower, back to drinking; their wings clapping the Herculean effort. Slither Down from a ladder, a smile wide spider, legs slithers of air, sliding down its thread, as slight as an atom, the whisper of evening, lines drawn from ancient evolution, millions of atoms less than this blundering ape but so much more. I pinch the thread and move it, reverentially, all Creation bobbing on molecules, then scuttling silently into the carpet, invisibility. Miniature Steam Desperate to see the miniature steam train leave the single track train toy station in the Grossen Garten of Dresden, the father has his daughter and son run, run fast, the little boy squeals out in panic, his sister grabs his hand and pulls to piston his legs. They arrive just as the train gushes away from the platform, smoky carriages full of smile-smeared faces. Hooting father aims his camera at his children as they stand to attention, in awe of the steel and steam. Still Beauty, Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic, March. On a hill above Karlovy Vary, winter’s leafy waste still carpeting the empty woods. Snowy patches still on the elbows of the Ore Mountains, fending off East Germany. Still colourful the grand Victorian spa hotels in the narrow valley below where mineral-drenched spring waters quench tourists. Above private jets ferrying rich Russians, beautified bodies molded. Still luminous moss on the grave stones in Hrbitovni cemetery below where three still figures squat, hidden in hoods. Under a leaning yellow willow tree, a Czech woman in a red coat sits still, staring into her Sixties, long black hair like the fine, forlorn branches, tickled by cold March fingers. Two boys walk past, just cubs testing strength: elbowing and flicking each other; never still with never-men giggles. Carefully Cutting
Across the open courtyard in a halo of yellow light the old woman sits eating her lunch, carefully cutting apart her meal, making the most of each morsel, chewing over what has been: children, husband, parents just a faint taste, nothing to say, eating alone under a yellow light. Later she shuffles past windows, a flickering image on film, a grainy reflection of my wife without me. The Goat Knows The goat knows it is the festival of Dashain in Kathmandu: time to die in thanks to Maa Durga for defeating the buffalo- demon Mahishasura after ten days of fighting. But the goat is no hungry Hindu, its legs speak of living stubbornly sticking out into the gutter. The goat's owner, a boy with a mischievous grin, wishing for Maa Durga’s ten arms, tugs, tugs, tugs at the leash. The goat's head nods in the image of agreement to the wisdom of the Bhagavad Gita, but the legs knows better: the head will soon be sliced off, stuck on a table, tongue sticking out, tasting the lies of goat afterlife, blood running in the gutter. So the legs keep battling with the heart of a buffalo and the boy tugs, tugs, tugs with all ten of his imaginary arms and suddenly wins, dragging the goat up onto the pavement, off to meet its maker and make Maa Durga happy. Published in The Brasilia Review, March 2017. |
Poetry Biography:I have had over 70 poems published in the following worldwide magazines and literary journals: A Handful of Stones, Acta Victoriana (Canada), All the Sins (UK), The Amethyst Review (USA), Amsterdam Quarterly (NL) The Blue Nib (Ireland), Bolts of Silk, Borderless Journal, The Brasilia Review (Brazil), Bushfire Literature & Arts Review (US), Cadenza, Cake Magazine, Carillon, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal (Hong Kong), DASH (USA), Clackamas Literary Review (USA), Cooch Behar Anthology, Dawntreader, Dreamcatcher, The Dillydoun Review, Earth Love, The Ear (US), Eastlit (East Asia), Erbacce, Envoi, Finger Dance Festival, Ginosko, Gloom Cupboard, Hidden Channel, Inlandia Journal, IS&T (Ink, Sweat & Tears), Into the Void (Canada), The Journal, The Lakeview Journal (India), Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Lunch Ticket (USA) The New Writer, One Hand Clapping, Orbis, Oregon English Journal (USA), The Passage Between, Prole, Sentinel Literary Quarterly, Sonic Boom (India), Third Wednesday (USA), Of Nepalese Clay (Nepal), New Contrast (South Africa), One Hand Clapping, Opportunity Publishing, The Oregon English Journal (USA) Origami Poems Project (USA), The Paddock Review (USA), Panoplyzine (USA), Paper Swan Press, The Passage Between, The Peacock Journal (USA), Pens on Fire, Poetry Salzburg (Austria), Potomac Review, (USA) Prole, Pulsar Poetry, Rear View Poetry, Queen Mob's Teahouse, Qutub Minar Review (India), Red Ink, Shiela-Na-Gig (USA), South Bank Poetry Magazine, Stand, Waterford Teachers Centre, (Ireland) We Are a Website New Literary Journal (Singapore), Weber - The Contemporary West Review (USA), Windfall (USA), Writing Magazine, Words for the Wild and Verbal Art (India). Archives
March 2024
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