Sleep mass

Migrant library | The wind wipes clean the ashes — slate me in for 6

Sleep mass |

Old texts | Fire begins the last redrafting

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We had a home in books | then came war |     | Our kitchens turned to roads | Troops unstrung barbed wire | across our neon bar with dolphins |     | Miserable weather | rain and wind | We try to squeeze | under a pink |     | cocktail umbrella |     | all 5 of us |     | Then came war |     | Rubble chic |     | We chip with picks and small hammers | on the inside | of a huge skull | skull like a mountain | got a job | washing dishes | in an |     | Smoke in shapely dragons | rolls across the mother |     | teeth |     | blown out |     | it took hours to get | the girls to sleep | Then came war |     | Her fingers | drop from the sides of glass | it’s as if | they’re made of ceramic | can’t keep them | on her hand | I don’t worry | it’s just a d | r | e | a | m |     | The powder | smeared across our visas | the ferns | growing in | the car | the persistent | drip of moisture | the water | in the marital bed | so cold | and laced | with bacteria | the girls |     | Fire begins | to remodel buildings | bombs began | to rebuild | in shattering |     | our kitchen |     | we a books in |     | Sleep mass: sleep mass |     | so dense | so beautiful | like a fir forest | stretching on forever | where fire begins | and we all want to leave | but must stay | or | conversely | we all want to stay | but must start | leaving |     | Not this way | to the pool | have you a | window | in your diary? |     | You reach out | your fiery hands | to stroke at dimples | it took hours to get |     | we huddled under | a pink paper | cocktail |     | all 4 of us |     | and I tried to remember | the words of the |     | Then war came

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from the series Syntax | series of poems, commenced 2018, ongoing
This poem: March 2020

Cat Street (Hong Kong)

Moonlight quarry, hare’s rift.

In trucks, on rails: here to there.

Kiln story, vase fire.

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Hare’s dash, put up by the dogs |     | Taking away the mountain’s heart, beat |     | by |     | beat |     | In trucks, on rails, to SoHo, to Kensington |     | Boutiques and Keats: boutiques and Keats | in SoHo | and Kensington |     | Levelled slowly, taking away | the mountain’s heart |     | piece |     | by |     | piece |     | This is a station story | en route to Detroit | antiques store | in Cat Street | Hong Kong |     | trains leaving | in all directions |     | Vase, in stillness, whispers | the kiln’s story |     | Chrysanthemum fury, very |     | still |     | When the kiln purrs | put your ear | close |     | will you hear |     | the fire’s story? |     | Levelled |     | slowly

•

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from the series Syntax | series of poems, commenced 2018, ongoing
This poem: September 2018

The days of the last words

Via catastrophic descent

When the first time was still in flower

I loved it there, but

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The prophets had put me on hold, I couldn’t get through | there was bland music | a soothing voice |     | Along the roads you destroyed | in the ambulance you ruined | with paramedics you betrayed | to the hospital you let run down | may you be carried | more slowly than the poor | you let die | and as you die | in the bed you despised | in the ward you forgot | under the roof you let leak | so the rich could have more | I would like to ask you | For this? | You did it for this? | As the ghost doctors float away | and the nurses in smoke | the burnt firemen lie | in their corroded engines | by the gutted towers | you failed to protect | as you die | among the many deaths you have caused | so the rich could have more | I would like to ask you | For this? |     | They asked me to wait in reception | there was the musical tinkling and clacking of empty shells | hung from the bleached timber | by a fraying piece of string | and a young girl trailed up and down the beach | trying to sell a pineapple to tourists | but my password was wrong | and the website crashed | and the phone cut off | and there was no signal | then the conclusion was obvious | so I wanted to let you know, but |     | They were the days of the last words | before nostalgia went out of fashion | when we unfurled so very calmly | and gently | with the delicate inexorability of flowers | and we were naked from the waist up | and I lay on my front | you blew a flock of goosebumps | along the back of my neck | into my hair | and we rested on the banks | of an invisible river | where the dead came to bathe | and the fact those times have gone | forms a bright, rigid, inescapable | part of my suffering | while the fact those times came into being | at all | gives me no consolation | but merely | adds to my |     | Now here we are | and are not | on the shore of a circular sea | the plane burning in the background | the materialists running towards us | waving sheets of paper with maths and stats | explaining the rates of descent | the secret in the laughter | the danger in our mouths | resting close | one upon another | in our derelict syntax | stranded at Frankfurt | but who could explain | the forces that now | so conspicuously | and yet so obscurely | emptied our mirrors | snipped off the hands | of our expensive wristwatches | or the voice telling me | so simply | It will be fine | It will be calm | It will be better — exactly as if | you never | wrote this poem?

•

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from the sequence syntax | a new story (ongoing, commenced 2018)
(this poem, March 2020)

Sung echoes

Dragon wreathe, over inner shadow

China space from space | conjure

The void put to use | water | flowers

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The story flows over the scene, and the scene flows with it | Pots with Sung echoes, with Cornish glazes | the tang of flung salt burning |     | Some hidden destiny, no destiny at all | and side by side, always side by side |     | cloud wreathe over dragon image | passing | Ancient vessels for a new spring’s flowers | freshness cut from the ground and put to decor | we grew introverted, like the Sung | at the crash site where the wreckage smoked | the story flows by |     | Passing |     | The rules to order meaning | and the fate of thinking | is Syntax

 

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from the series Syntax | series of poems, commenced 2018, ongoing
This poem: September 2018