Belshazzar I never knew myself to have a Persian beard, now, This is odd, this will need some explanation So too the crown and concubines and all these Half-drunk vessels from the house of God Isn’t it 2023 or 2022—was I not, just now, Pulling up in a Subaru or whatever it is I Get … Read more
April Light I’ve let the world of people go in favour of growing spring evenings, what all the buds know, the jonquils and the willow, the prattling birds, water chasing water to river, fold of showers. What sage said April is the cruellest month, the year’s promise in its tall shadows? Let the world of … Read more
It Isn’t Just A House It isn’t just a house. It’s the sacred place I took my babies home to after their tiring journey into this world. Their sweet new born cries filled the air with beautiful, new life! Their laughter, first steps, the almighty tantrums. Will the walls whisper their names when we are … Read more
Hope in Despair I have always loved museums, no doubt having a kind of prophetic disposition I realised the somewhat terrible and prodigious potency that was entombed in their almost sterile yet paradoxically life-affirming grace. Loss, chronic loss, is the ultimate domain of all humans. It seems to me that the problems here below on … Read more
SONNET XIV for Diane Windsor When I was still the husband of the wind — when I was Leopardi-sure I’d never know a woman’s body’s ways — when I was nineteen – when I was Prufrock-positive of mermaids never singing to me, either, of a life without betrothal or progeny – – when I … Read more
On Opening A Door When I left the cafe I planted my leading foot beside the door The front of my shoe just nudging the skirting And I reached for the handle with my opposite hand. I only mention this because (and eschewing false modesty) my positioning was perfect. It was perfect. My carriage optimally … Read more
Gratitude “Hate it here? But why?” I’m sick of your confounded cry. London is Open— But when is a kind word spoken At 8 AM when elbows stab your side, A slouching drunk swallows your Pride, And grinning altruists shiver and wait For you to blink and take their bait? And so we move in … Read more
Commuting with Baudelaire We are living in a time when there are no gentlemen. So, women stand for hours without being offered any seats. It’ s a privilege which they have laboured for and for centuries, It appears! Madness, I know, but you must respect them. As you watch their small fists tightening on the … Read more
Poets may be divided into three types: those of us who must be and are, or have been, suppressed, at least until after we are dead; those whose subject matter is so commonplace/banal that it doesn’t matter either way; and then those who become pure decorations of the Regime. One key qualification for a poet … Read more
When I’m Allowed Leave The Cancer Ward with thanks to Claire Higgins for four of these lines When I get out of here I plan to open a factory that manufactures miniature guillotines which will be given away gratis to bullied schoolchildren to keep hidden in their bedrooms until I give the signal. When I … Read more