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[ 1 ]
over breakfast he said
'making love to you –
when I am closest to you –
that is
when I feel the most alone
because, no matter what
we are always, everywhere, alone'
as if the act of love
were final proof of separation
as
if loving
was evasion, hypocracy
as if I can never,
ever, be close to him
as if we can never say what we mean
as if, no matter what
we are always, everywhere, alone
[ 2 ]
in Limassol Zoo a dozen big cats laze, yawn and bicker
this is
not their country; they prowl, preen, lie listless,
prowl
again: three paces, turn, three paces
dreaming of elsewhere,
elsewhere
on London Bridge myriad commuters jostle and swarm
strange
interior silence of a crowd
faces shut off, bodies bent on
some urgent goal
off-screen, elsewhere, elsewhere
but in crystal waters a thousand dazzling fish
dart, spiral,
swim in stunning unison
here onstage a string quartet
nonchalantly makes accidental
counterpoint
wings pulsing in an ice-blue sky, a cloud of starlings wheels
in V-formation:
what does it feel like to be the bird in front?
[ 3 ]
what's real? this – choose anything – this – is it real?
what
we're playing – this – that – was it real?
where's it gone?
what's real? the lost Leonardo
the re-discovered figurine –
whose mind were they in
all these years? did they exist?
where?
life
passes by like a parade
we look away (perhaps we are somewhere
else)
memory – we watch like a movie
a face – it floats and fades
what's real? I believe this so it's real – really?
I would make a stand for this, so it's real – do you
say so?
but we act on our prejudices without
thinking
is this real? is this real for you? is this really real?
[ 4 ]
I have this memory of childhood:
on the creosoted fence,
hundreds of them –
daddy-longlegs, teetering, prancing
what happens when you pull a wing off?
do the legs pull off
too?
what to do with the little worm left wriggling?
dark smell of stained wood and
all the
unforgivable things ever since
said and done
to people's hurt
hundreds of daddy-longlegs
squash them against the fence, a
dozen at a time
or grab one by the wing, watch it struggle –
one-winged flight, is it possible?
forgiveness –
how, with a wing missing?
[ 5 ]
we jerk and prance, dangling on wires from a frame
marionettes, we nod and leap at the puppeteer's tilt
Desire
Narcotic Aflame is the puppeteer's nickname
bored with a love that stays too
safe or too long the same
we plunge into affairs, drowning, up to the hilt
we posture,
dance, dangling on wires from a frame
the fabric of our love, loose-wove, soft, warm, became
a
ripped rag, spoiled, the rending of a quilt
Death Never Alone
is the puppeteer's nickname
damage done without a glance, no prick of shame
thoughtless or
careless whether blood is spilt
we preen, romance, dangling on
wires from a frame
or, balking at the danger, old love reclain
expect forgiveness
as a right, no prod of guilt –
Dickhead Naked Annihilate is
the puppeteer's nickname
from conquest to conquest the sad procession, game after game
on and on till there's no-one left to jilt
we jerk and
prance, dangling on wires from a frome
Desire Narcotic Aflame
is the puppeteer's nickname
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