Auckland Poetry.com

Deadly sex

I knew she was seeing other men but pretended
I didn’t know didn’t risk confront her,
It pleased her ego to have sex with many men.
She wanted me to know about her infidelity it
made her lusty. She hinted she teased, bloody
games she played and our love got more intense,
anger was involved, left scars on our mind and
our bodies. It was love that kills, I didn’t play
that game, her next lover strangulated her… how
easily it could have been me. Desperate to win
her love I nearly killed her twice

If They Could Talk.

The walls in the bedroom were once creamy
reflecting the former occupants middle class
pretensions, now they were just winter grey
and sad as only walls can be that have had their
favourite pictures removed and placed on walls
unknown, in a new home in some out of town
housing estate.

Not only the bedroom but every wall, ceiling
and floor of this two story house were bare, it
only housed a ghosts that was adapt at stealing
copy pens, it was standing there by the curtain
less window in the living room (what irony)
contemplating if it should move into the office
block across the road only they didn’t use pens
there anymore.

People wrote words on a screen and sent them
into a void or to people who deleted them before
reading what had been written. Morning now,
the common soul of every plank in the house
and waited for executioners, in overalls, to come
end the old order of things and build a shiny new
city centre, with rings roads, supermarkets and
a grand opera house.

The Thing

In my home town they were closing down
the old library, going digital, giving away
leather bound book. I parked by its door
got as many beautiful old books as I could
carry, alas, I had parked in a no parking zone
the police had dismantled my car, an officer
guarding the pieces said if I paid the police
would come back and reassemble the car,

I agreed, but it began raining, they couldn’t
come before it stopped, staggered back to
the library with my book, but it had shut its
doors for the day. And did it rain, the books,
now a dough of damp leather and wet paper
gave birth to a ugly, slimy thing that crawled
back to the library leaving asexual spores of
dense, computerized words behind.

Haiku

Summer sunlight
Filtered through green leaves
Made old moss golden

Saying

Chase the rainbow
Not for its illusory gold
But its beauty

Senryu

The carob tree’s shade,
Soft as a dusky mistress
A tropical night

The Long Delusion

I sat in a café when she came in, hadn’t seen her
for ten years, she had aged badly, used to be slim
now she was scrawny, and her glorious red hair
had lost its lustre. Her eyes grey and bland, they
used to light up and shine as diamonds in the heat
of the night, perhaps they still did. She sat down
we had coffee talking about harmless things

Then she said: “Why did you always give in and
agree with me when we had an argument?”
I was going to say: “I wasn’t interested enough in
the cause to argue about it” but said: You know
me dear, everything for a bit of peace in the house.”
I thought it was because you didn’t love me,” she
said and for a moment looking lost.

I was an island in a stream of people, but hear and
saw nothing, what a fool, how deluded, I had been
all those years, of course I didn’t love her, it was her
warm embrace I had yarned for and still did.
When I looked up to agree with her for the last time
She had gone she had gone, her scent lingered in
The air, then dissipated as all things must.

Helping the Banks

The night is as obscure as homemade wine the TV screen
casts a grave light in a room that has no shadow; presidents
and prime ministers appear tell us of financial woes, even
the forgotten George Bush is there; they say they are doing
the best they can and that savers money is safe; but I know
they are as powerless as I’m, but they were the ones who
let lose the beast of a free market believing in the myth that
it would correct itself that is to ask a drunk to stop drinking,
gallons of booze and it are all free. “And your money is safe”
is not true, when a bank goes belly up the savers money is
the first to go. Had I money I would take them out and place
them under my mattress but since I’m broke I tell you.
They will try to stop you say it will make matters worse, so
let it; withdrawing you money is the only power you have,
you have little to lose, they will lose everything for without
your cash they are nothing

Cena De Amor (Love scene)
By IBN BAQI ca 1145
translated from Poruguese

When the night curls up
Its tail of shadow and
Drinks dark wine so thick
That is as lunching on dust,
Absorbed through nostrils;

And it tightens around me
Like a brave man grips
His sword; and its pleats
Hang like standards from
My shoulders;

That’s when I give in to
The sweet weight of sleep
It breaks up our embrace
And I push her away from me,
The object of my love,
‘Cause it is impossible to sleep
On a pulsating pillow

The Dancers

Went to a dancing competition, but little did
I know it was naked dancing by grotesque
old people, the audience, all young, laughed
violently, great fun this, till their faces
became a mask of horror, when realizing they
were looking at their own future.

Someone pointed a finger at me and shouted
“he is old.” and hundred hands began pushing
me to the dance floor and tearing off my suit,
but I was able to jump out of an open window
were I landed in a stream five fathom deep, of
tears that had forgotten why they had cried,
and crocodile tears shed at gravesides;

I drank it all went back to the window spewed
it over the shameless old people who had let go
of their dignity in pursuit of eternal youth, and
fled into the woods. Torchlight, barking dogs
and angry voices: Get him, he isn’t a democrat
wants to stop us having innocent fun, would
have been a good nazi, string him up.”

Pale sunrise, still- life- forest- a deer grazes
in the clearing, suddenly it jumps in the air,
a red rose is born on its chest, and as a single
rifle shot echoes amongst trees, a day begins.

October

Woke up with a start, the night was cold
a dream had disturbed my peace;
a black hole in the ground loose soil from
its edges kept falling into its endlessness.

Got up looked out of the window into a street
of pale light, my breath fogged up the glass
I saw a distorted image of my youth;
“How old you are,” it mocked.

I pressed my head against the glass, tried
to make friend with my tormentor; and
behind stillness I heard the hum of
the long sea rippling on nirvana’s strand

twilight invades

the cool silence

with long shadows

in birdsong

I want to go

far away to where

sunlight glows amber on the sea

where children

flash their teeth at sunset

devouring the evening

with laughter.

the sky is so far

and my heart is strung over

so many skies.

Who can offer solace?

or even a pause in the rush

of sensations

tumbling my chest

against an unknown shore

The Jogger

They said he had invented jogging and he was quite
addicted to his invention, ran every afternoon longer
and longer distances; till he dropped dead.
“He had congenital heart disease and would have died
anyway,” the defenders of jogging said.

Sure but that’s not the point he could have died when
copulating, angling, having a splendid meal with wine
or congenial drink with friends in the bar, and not
prancing about in shorts on a cold road alone a chilly
autumnal evening.

O Marmelo (a pear shaped fruit of
the quince, tree can also mean
“Saio de Mulher” Bosom)
Al-Musahfi ca 982
Translated from
old Portuguese by Jan Oskar Hansen

O Marmelo
Is of the colour yellow that of shame
A narcissist’ tunic and it has a musky
Penetrating aroma

As the perfume of once beloved and has
The same force as the heart but has
The colour of one who is in love and
haggard.

Her paleness is but an imprint of my pallor
And my breath has the aroma
Of my woman’s breaths

Fragrant when the fruit is lifted from the branch
Under the brocade of woven leaves, suavely
In my hand I carry it indoors and put it as
A costly treasure, in my alcove

Dressed in grey down which flutters on its
Smooth golden body

And when in my hand, naked sans its shirt-
The colour of narcissism- makes me record
What I can’t express as the heat of my vigor
Fades and drips between my fingers

Tomorrows World

So the world is a changing greed has failed,
Now we shall all work unselfishly for, and
Together heal the world, make financial rules
Based on trust, honesty and real democracy.

We will suffer together and prosper together,
But as usual the majority will suffer while
The minority will prosper, and when time is
Right greed will be back on the agenda.

This of course may sound pessimistic, but it
Is human nature, the will to survive; if there
Are no games to play, no wars to fight
Humans will simply sink into apathy and die

Television

My sister’s was the first in our street to buy TV,
an ugly, shiny mahogany box in the corner, and
since it was early afternoon and no program on,
stood there blinking as having dust in its eye.

Monday, film night on TV, the whole family
was there and neighbours too. Curtains drawn,
even though it was summer and still daylight, we
sat in darkness, in silence caused by our awe.

A Bergman movie, early TV in Norway tended
to take itself serious. I remember the whiteness
of the screen and how it reflected on the faces of
an enchanted audience.

Glistening cars in the rain, where her house once
stood there is now a parking lot; I’m the only one
alive, but every face, that evening, is etched on my
mind. Glass clear in black & white

Birthday

In the doorway of
a restaurant
music plays behind me,
dancers move to
a Finnish tango.

Glitter on the ceiling,
happy faces,
a few drinks more and
wrong words uttered,
steel blades glint in
the knuckled hands of my
dysfunctional relatives.

The Heat Before The Rain.

The blue bird that flew over the houses had wings that
cast shadows in the olive grove, the docile mule bolted
kicked over the bucket of water, I had carried from
the well, it jumped over a stone fence. Didn’t make it fell
broke a leg. I called my neighbour he likes to kill things, something unresolved, I gather, from his sad childhood.
All that blood a small river trickled and sank into parched
ground, where autumnal flowers sprung up and hid
the dead body in an orgy of colours, that got brighter and
brighter when feasting on decay till they exploded into
a shower of rainbows which attracted dark clouds, and it
rained; huge drops- bigger then a crocodile’s- tears.
Next day the mule grazed as before, docile as nothing had happened, but under an olive tree I found a knife with dry
blood on, and my neighbour was yonder trimming almond
trees that now have brown leaves and are full of nuts.

Princess.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      I I will to bring you peace;

I will share your grief.

I will help you find,

Your dreams in our land.

I will dance,

With you,

On the open plain.

And we will sing,

Warm,

On the cold, cold moon.

I will bring you peace,

Embrace you in your grief,

And dance with you

Into dreams.

The progression of submission  -by Sarah Rowland

Aspirations, dreams, accelerating to be,

Foot in front of foot, impressions only to leave.

Hesitating departures coming only to overdue,

Lost in the old, navigating the new.

Say goodbye to everything that is nothing,

Open a door to a better something.

Inside there lies the path to change,

Destinations to lead the way.

“Twisted little star how fucking far are you?

I’ve sent so many wish’s, are they getting through?

Unjust it that you’ve lit only to guide me into the dark,

Travelling blank your labyrinth now to be my lark.

Tired on my knees, begging you please,

I for an end to my means.

Deserving of accomplishment in which I can lay,

Rightly owed the rewards I should gain.”

“My friend, a life’s not lived quietly dreamt but experienced aloud,

And little substance you’ll gain with your head in the clouds.

The original nature of that you wish to loose,

Should surely be yours and not a star’s to choose.

Freedom is a right, yet there are those still chained and cage,

You’ll never understand its power till you’ve understood the crave.

Will and want are only the start of life’s game,

By by-standing its lessons its awards are earned in vain.

Change is that of losing ones original nature,

And should only be dealt by its creator.

Without true strength you’ll become it’s slave,

Action is yours only, battle for its day.

Inconsequent Calamity.

Men in suits carrying cardboard boxes out of a bankrupt
finance house, it isn’t money they carry out but private
belongings, picture of wife and kids and executive toys,
so what do I care? In the basement where there are no
gleaming windows and walls are cement grey, damp and
unadorned, the janitor sits, he lives from one pay check to
the next, won’t be paid this week though;

maybe he should join the navy and see the world, but at
sixty five it isn’t a wise thing to do. But he has, unlike
the suits upstairs, been unemployed before, he can, if he
must, sweep the streets of New York. The TV’s glare and
sympathy is not on him, the world of middle class men
worries about their own future not the janitor’s or his son
who is on his third tour of duty in Iraq.

Look back in Sadness.
(Written as Tanka)

Bundle of photos
Face down in a cigar box
Family and friends
From a time that is a dream
Fading into eternity

Mostly black & white
How young my parents looked
Now I’m the oldest
Siblings faded fast away
As I sailed many seas

Non returnable
Past’s gate is firmly padlocked
Wait in no mans land
Know there is no remedy
The past really is a dream.

US Soldiers.

Full of propaganda and democratic zeal
the US soldiers came to Iraq; five years
later they now know there is no “Mission
Accomplished.” The soldiers have grown
up and no longer believe in this war, they
now call useless, mockingly laugh when
politicians speak of winning.

Good, working-class kids, manipulated
and lied to, from small towns and rural
communities, they are true Americans
who love their country, I salute them and
hope their leaders will think well before
asking them to fight, bleed and die for yet
another useless war.

Diet Business

Chocolate that slims, on bar substitute a snack
between meals, and it will not make you fat.
Ninety calories a bar; the wrapper has a silhouette
of a slim person stretching upwards… to heaven?

And she is slim as an angel, for seraphs it is easy
they don’t eat, never hungry, no need for food
which must make their days with only harp music?
to break the tedium of gossiping about the boss.

Snacked five times to day it hasn’t made me thin
my greed is for all to see. From my window I can
see into a café people there drink cold beer, they
are not fat so beer is a dieters dream… lots of it.

(Wedding Party)

Sailing down night Seine
Champagne brut and goose liver
The Eiffel Tower
Dressed in bright coloured charms
Looked like a demi monde

When the barge banked
I gave Seine the bird’s liver
Peed in the river
Studied the sliver of moon
Dreaming of ice cold lager

Paris’s night streets
September mild and at ease
Bars and bistros shut
The worthless slept in doorways
And I thought of Edit Piaf

“Do you want to know a secret?” he said
As he laid upon his bed
His frail old bones so tired now
His hair all but gone from his head

I smiled at him with his weathered face
His hand reaching mine with such tender grace
My heart wrapped in his as I searched his eyes
Words interrupted by breathless sighs

“I’ve lived my life with an open eye
And have been so inspired as the days have gone by.
I made a promise when I was your age
That I’d never be kept within a locked cage”

This man whom I’d loved my entire life through
Was about to teach me something new
So I squeezed his hand a little tighter
Knowing him as my “Heroic Fighter”

“Each day of your life, each moment you live
Keep finding your Inspiration”. He said
His face came alive as he smiled at me
Laying upon his sun drenched bed

“You’ll know in your heart for you’ll be lifted higher
And warmth will surround your Soul”
“Remember to let Inspiration be free
For then you will reach your goal”

His words meant a lot when he spoke that day
And it seemed my life changed in some kind of way
This man in my mind, who inspired me so
Did well to help me learn and grow