Auckland Poetry.com

Clothed in smiles
Lingering warm touches
Flattering words
Laughter after lunches.
A thick, blinding curtain
fogging vital truths.
walking she’s uncertain,
her heart’s turned aloof.
Deceit sneers at her
Weaving layers of lies
She replies yes sir,
as her spirit torn cries.
Destruction chains her neck
pulling her away
leaving the mark of death
a stench of ashtray.
Helpless to whom she serves
she no longer sees the way
stamped with his ownership
the sun has removed its ray.

Ode to the Clinker-built kauri cutter. New Lynn Sea Scout Cutter 73 Manukau
A dedication to mariners lost at sea

SHADOWLESS SEA
Manukau loose your tethered painter:
just one more time for me
slap your polished belly
upon this belligerent sea.

Manukau let your bow plunge:
to gulp the cooling liquor
that slakes your wicked thirst
that swells your kauri lungs

Rise up brave Manukau:
to taste the dripping sticking spume
rise up
to fight and not to heed the wounds.
Be prepared our Manukau

For this is no ordinary sea
no mere scudding sky
mere bruised and swollen tide
your mainsail sets to ply.

Alas Oh Manukau
your sailing days have ended
your crew has tossed their oars
their service has been rendered
way enough; blades fore and aft
Rejoice our Manukau

For this is no ordinary accolade
no mere fleeting cosmic adulation
mere brief delightful charade
this is your tiker-tape parade.

Oh Manukau turn away now
and do not gaze with awe
upon this shadowless sea
whose waves are made of straw
in aquatic nativity
Behold our Manukau

For those unyielding tides
we are powerless to subdue
have stolen our barnacled fortress
their sticky frothy heads
leave a crooked smile on the beach
for everyone to view.

Geoffrey S D Cooke 07/10/2009

The Girl in the Frame (revised)

Innocent stranger,
Indeed, you bloom around gills and fall
beneath the radar under a sky dripping with
illusion

the woman rocks her child to sleep
and a scarf drifts over the rubble of her features
her torn up life the ruins she now lives in
walls crumble as pepper dust drying out

the wheels grind away
the teeth she was left with
she invites her friends
in public but the chairs were
burnt by the soldiers for firewood

the night she lost her roof
the planes fly overhead
louder than before
the rain on mother’s big bed
and the lines down the walls
where the water runs

she lives thus in the public mind
takes dogs out for walks
leads them out of the trap
and into the summer

the illusion kept her between
four lines guarding the
boundary of her thought
the gates of reason
closed until the return
of the florists and the bell ringer

Nicholas Alexander
Copyright © 2009

The Poet’s Tree

On the plateau, at a distance, I saw a large tree
with multi coloured leaves, on each one was
printed a commercial poem, a verse for every
occasion and written as not to hurt any one’s
feelings. I asked for a poem about unjust wars
in the Middle East, the tree had none but I was
offered a few about World War One. All wars
are just and the winner gets to write the rules.
The tree, stood inside rolls of barbed wire, no
copy pens allowed within a radius of fifty yards.
A storm came, blew the wire around like tumble
weed, leaves- torn from the tree- flew in the air
and transformed into grooming tropical birds
cooing about love. I did find a pale green leaf,
almost transparent, on it was written in blood;
“Gaza is my name let me not die in vain”

The sun rose above our heads
giving me moments to absorb its ointment
and notice your gentle breath coaxing teasing
and tugging the wandering flock of clouds now
distant as the tremble under your eyelid
settles me
to a peace
unknown in my war-torn dream-life
away from
home

- Nicholas Alexander
- 19 June 1992

a fusion of particles happens in the mirror
the image of here and now
is lost before it becomes
then and when
photographs were used to remember
visits by the grandparents no longer answering
the phone
visits by generations past long gone
now here and now and opening
the gate walking up the path
about to knock on the door

squinting thru the smoky window

again

agonizing need for clear euphoria

I see that mountain

concealed

thru the window

that mound of dirty mud

piled higher than elephant shit

no desire to focus

dancing thru the dry iced dawn

I’ll take my study of avoidance

with one more breath drawn

and choking laughter

stinging eyed joy

correctional balancing of mind

revealing beautiful half notes

cradling the divine musical door

its wide open

hence rusty reality no user can use

the knocking pisses me off

turn toward momentary time

of tingles

arousing playfully

the lost child that’s willingly lost

in the maze of real truth

nothing and no where

is the real truth

the reality

the dimensions

densities’

hello 5^th dimension

I welcome you

my kind and gentle soft view addiction

with no judgment

no star tears falling like raindrops

and no mountain

just a smoky window

filled with glittering dust and sparkling diamonds

kicking off prisms of om’

again

written by Vanessa 13/11/07

A owl in the crystal lens it tells & capturing face; emotion & heavy eyed. Lifts lid & stared & copy cat wrists in bangle & everything is silver he needs to escape through & break this dislike. “I don’t know ya, But,… I can understand ya” -repeat silently back & forever knowing anger & wants you to forget & he stares at you taking of his hat & borrows time for you I’m staying.

Humans designed for pain wee man thinks & destinations death, hollow legions capture our pavements gutter & lay lost, solitude found in question & interrogation the weak he still belches & answering the ego’s fears the fool stands faking his theory & he must need it, needs to know & leader wept & ambassador to his he finds some comfort & answer uncovers the jukebox den & his deceased soul hides behind his tombstone & needs to be shown sorrow & love “would anybody care, I was a somebody?” & silence seekers moan…fool crys & wonders when a tune is ever played for him – “who’s demeaning who?” sings wee man.

In my hands lays a life

In this life is power and in the power is the opportunity

And the opportunity is greatness.

How often as one small lone voice changed the course of history for ever

How often has one small deed done by just one person changed the lives of so many for so long?

And yet all this is thrust into my hands in just a moment of time

It is thrust in my hands in the form of the most innocent, fragile and beautiful creature that god has created – a new born baby.

A baby with no more or less chance in the world than the other baby that was born just the other day

A baby whose beauty far surpasses that of the father’s dreams and whose grace, discipline and potential shall be forged in the fires of life.

But what is it worth to forge a life if you can’t grow it in wisdom.

So to this new born baby with all the potential, and all the trust and love that the world could provide in just one person I say: “I shall lead with Joy so you can follow with glee”

(* dedicated in waves of love for the greatest Mammalian flotilla

    This is a wail of a song not to die for)

One thousand wails

Southern Ocean sales

Guised is no deception

For a belly ton of indigestion

Spurious lashings of what’s for dinner

Served with the repetitious wail

The minke has got thinner

Japan you’re not a winner

Think environmental sinner

Have I harpooned on enough?

Does it echo my disgust?

via Cetaceans communicated calibrations

swum to intelligent sound deliberations  

The minke has got thinner

Japan you’re not a winner

Think environmental sinner

Deana Platt Copyright 19/11/07

Land and Sea

The land belongs to the sea and the sea belongs to thee
The way I figure it is our ancestors came from the sea
Sure they were lizards, fat lazy old lizards but before they
walked about pushing trees over or fighting it out
smashing exoskeleton against exskeleton
- bits broke off and dust clouded our view – they emerged from the deep

The land belongs to the sea as it grew out of
it
borne out of itself
before the land
was water – water

water everywhere you looked

who is to say when land
first appeared and the first creature
staked a claim to it

sought to dominate by saying it
belonged to it

the land belongs to the sea
and the sea, it belongs to thee

Now is the King of the Land holed up in his fortress
immune to the odd attack?
As his defenses were extreme
the army in his pay laid everything to waste
they wanted to kill murder and rape
they were rewarded with titles and slaves
and claimed that land
but it already belonged to the place.

They would only be conquered
by the King of the Sea.

Thinking their towers of stone
were held together fast with hard mud
thinking the army held it together
by titular examples of valour (by thugs)
thinking their actions
would provide villages for children
to watch them poisoned by drugs
that army marched over the daisies
crushed them like ice
with hammers

so the old man staggers
and waves a stick at the passing cloud
it was once his land but now it’s ours
as the march of his money is counted
that army devours the flowers

it was enough
the waves swallowing him
he holds the stick over his head
unharmed certain of death in her tender arms

the land belongs to the sea
and the sea
it belongs to thee