Theophile Marzials

A TRAGEDY

Death! Plop.
The barges down in the river flop.
Flop, plop.
Above, beneath.
From the slimy branches the grey drips drop,
As they scraggle black on the thin grey sky,
Where the black cloud rack-hackles drizzle and fly
To the oozy waters, that lounge and flop
On the black scrag piles, where the loose cords plop,
As the raw wind whines in the thin tree-top.
Plop, plop.
And scudding by
The boatmen call out hoy! and hey!
All is running water and sky,
And my head shrieks - "Stop,"
And my heart shrieks - "Die." 

My thought is running out of my head;
My love is running out of my heart,
My soul runs after, and leaves me as dead,
For my life runs after to catch them - and fled
They all are every one! -- and I stand, and start,
At the water that oozes up, plop and plop,
On the barges that flop
And dizzy me dead. 
I might reel and drop.
Plop.
Dead.
And the shrill wind whines in the thin tree-top
Flop, plop. 

A curse on him.
Ugh! yet I knew -- I knew --
If a woman is false can a friend be true?
It was only a lie from beginning to end --
My Devil -- My "Friend"
I had trusted the whole of my living to!
Ugh; and I knew!
Ugh!
So what do I care,
And my head is empty as air --
I can do,
I can dare,
(Plop, plop
The barges flop
Drip drop.)
I can dare! I can dare!
And let myself all run away with my head
And stop.
Drop.
Dead.
Plop, flop.
Plop.

Michael McClure

ELEPHANT HEAD: OPENER OF DOORWAYS

Great Ganesh, with your single tusk
and conch shell in your hand,
what is on the other side
of the Blackness?

What is not there in the non-dimensions,
in the nothing stuff, when it is freed
of the weight of our fistfull of senses?
What is the rosy musk of the other
side of our eyes and brain
preceding the fantasy of quarks and the rivers of novae?

Give me a
trillion senses
to bite it all like a blackberry 
and find the seeds caught
in my teeth.

When I spit, my sputum
will be the colors of it.
I know when I laugh
it rings
in 
me.

 

Ian Macmillan

SPOT

I've got a spot on my arm,
And another spot further up,
And another spot further down,
And another spot over there,
and if you join them up with a biro,
they make the one out of Blur, with the floppy hair,
Yes Alex James is on my arm,
You make him if you join the dots,
Alex keeps me away from harm,
I made him up from lots of spots.



ELVIS

Elvis in the bank,
Elvis in the shop,
Elvis in the pub loo,
Elvis in the footy crowd,
Elvis on the roof,
Elvis singing mighty loud,
Elvis lives and that's the truth,
Elvis never went away,
Elvis never died,
Elvis on the train today,
Elvis Presley's coughing lying,
Every fat man with a quiff,
Every chubby bloke,
Could be Elvis,
He was never stiff,
His death was just a joke.

I'M A YORKSHIRE MINIMALIST

I'm a Yorkshire minimalist, and I say nowt,
If I've got emotions, I don't let em out,
My response to joy, is a self defeated shrug,
If I won the lottery, I would not kiss or hug,
Cause I'm a Yorkshire minimalist, and I say nill,
And talky, talky, talky, talky, it really makes me ill,
Reet, thou knows, shutup, nowt, glum.

 

 

Sheryl Martin

DEVOTION

Okay, I admit it,
I watch the X-Files in the dark with a torch,
On my knees praying for Mulder to scorch the screen,
Which he does once a series,
Now if only the aliens would take back Scully.

 

 

Minamoto no Sanetomo

ZEN POEM
(translated from the Japanese by DL Upton, 1973)

powerful
rolling thunder waves
dashing, tearing,
crashing
on the rock-broken shoreline

 

Marilyn Monroe

DON'T CRY MY DOLL

Don't cry my child
Don't cry
I hold you and rock you to sleep.
Hush, hush, I'm pretending now I'm not your mother who died

 

HELP HELP

Help, help
Help I feel life coming closer
When all I want to do is die

 

I LEFT MY HOME

I left my home of green rough wood,
A blue velvet couch.
I dream till now
A shiny dark bush
Just left the door.

Down the walk
Clickity clack
As my doll in her carriage
Went over the cracks -
"We'll go far away."

 

TO THE WEEPING WILLOW

I stood beneath your limbs
and you flowered and finally clung to me
and when the wind stuck with...the earth
and sand - you clung to me.