indigo

when i hold that crystal there
it just feels nice

the indigo show tent:
a sock

plugged in the mouth
softens
 \these insults

show me the card trick -
again?
how did you do that?

did you hide it in your sleeve?

oh i see

time does that to me
every other day

just testin

just to see really
if there's anything still in there
i knock on dead wood

the inner precipice
is far far away
this fine day

a whole new
loneliness
is come home to stay

but that's ok
this mind is just
a figleaf

an ignorant trick
i would undo it
if i had the art

grime marks the corners
of all my
favourite windows

tiredness fills
the panes
and my veins

the drunken ghost
is gone
here i am left
as empty as air

there is no meaning here today
i am writing from an old palette
everything is grey

the voices
of those big ole booming trees
are lost to me

i can't even feel the way
to my own eulogy

ΔΙΑΤΡΙΒΩ

if
the
thought
precedes
the
word
then
how isntit
broadcast?
but
in its
own realm
does it
have a
less than
perfect
form?
Thquestion
endlessly
amuses
me
a sport
of old
is to
wonder
ifit
couldbe
so
mustbe
so
or what
marks
the true
change
between
now
and
forever
GOD
is the
answer
if you
ask the
right question
but perh
aps to
posit it
differnt
is to re
verse th
ordering
and get
you into
trouble
like
godot
did wit
his
DOG
or
ofolt
times
whenthere
wereno
speaces
itwas probably
purile to
wonder wher
etheword
behan
andifit
had a
particlarm
eaning
butletus
fastforward
a bit
as it is
soo
painful
here
thefirst
fillip
is a man
the second
isa woman
the third
is an
androgenous
child
if you
would prefer
to reorder it
the child is
first
thisi
sgod
the woman
then the
man.
if pain
is only
natural
then i am
the most natural
person
in the
world
for gash
my heart
it is a bastards
art
give me
a prime eat
lunch at five
don't go home
till we're all alive
it's hopeless
hopeless
my eye isputrid
i am a goat
tongued fat
arse and i
care abt
nothing
ouden
ouk tis
basileus
the bog
golf fog
is older
than de frog
and the ogle
is wogle than
the ergle.
barklaurate
endigo indigo
gark gark
fark flick
bower basement
of course
the nonsense
neverendeth
thereis more
ofit than therisof
nononsense
so howold is the
so howoldisthe
worled?
the echo
the cave is
inside the eart
there is caverna
there into itwego
allroundu
everywhere
itsurroundu
theluvtheluv
theluvtheluv
just agoaterd
just agoatherd
sure you can smoke!
indigo peacemeal
basement jax infomatic
forceskin pat the bak
bak the patch into
freewheeling secret
bobelyssium
nowt
echo boatwit witheldomseo
ragnet beltwished. fargo havesome
mole creek caverna plush
door into a plush room, the
carpet a kind of goo of
fertility, wipe one's bare feet
there like a baby just born
it's small head crinmpled
with the birthing irons,
the paste still on thick
the jelly flesh, bluish tubes
and pulsating ballsac and
labia, the folded eyes closed
until a little crack appears
and the deep black bead deeply buried
within shines back.
the birth of my son was
this likeness of evententimes
the old queanbeyan hospital
now demolished it being too
old and brick, the iron heaters
creaking, the enormous
sash windows with views of
downtown, rooms to ourselves
the ceiling 10ft high, hospital
green. there i am pacing with
the new bean, crying crying
wheeze and whistle the
throwing back of tears the
maggot like snuffle at the breast
and baked armpitful of smells
sensations noises vast
etherial basic timeless time.
rem sleep coming already
to the little head, behind
swolen eyelids, the dipping
in and out of what we here
call consciousness but is
really a flickering between
worlds the past and present
between bodies - the vast
and ancient, the new and
feotal nubile its manifest
workings a proof of a godless
lighning wand - that first breath
a bolt of bluest nature
in all her wonder creating
life out of the muck pond
yet again, 4 billion years
ago, the shuddering crack
still heard here in this little
laboratory of humanity.
the penis and vagina taking
human form - the baby
the unfolding umbilicus
and placental lung cut
adrift and wheeled away
the first spastic plasma
driven feeding drives nuzzles
digging into the breast,
the mother broken open
her waters flowing freely
body shaking and
feebly relief as clinging onto the
rockshelf of life, the wave
having washed over and
carried the baby away
then tossed it back
a gift clung tight there
in the blood smeared arms
tears and warm sweet
liquids apple juice
and amontillado and
salt and tar. rises
a piercing new voice.
so began it
the sore history of le flaneur
raconteur pseudo poetaster
manifesteur aflonzeur poer
had it #winkgate coming 2him 2day
a leading demonstrateur
that from putrefecation
flourisheth the seed bright
and green like lettuce or
a weed. but don't lets demonstrum
or let this fulcrum be determined
by ignoranium cranium or by apophis
apotheosis prothesis huxleian bull
no, instead let us send up the flag
on the distant moonscape and
see from there where lies the ground
is it here or in the air? where is it
does it stinK? it does, methink.
but where was we when the sordid
story broke? erstwhile me was there
on tea lavatory, whynot? diditgettoyoutoo?
bad splats are the answer to hope
down the drain withall horvathian
hopefest looseless dribblemonger
it isn't even half good dontyallknow.
but he begain in a sewer - that much
is true, halfspliced. into a tall tree he
grue - but that is only the fifth of it.
ten stories up was a plane a half plane,
a tenth of a plane, then no plane at all
very fast like a treefall at nightfall
no man's fault at all, nomanananda
deeptha thorium sheepaktha agorum
god thistle, it got stuck inthere in the
throat. nowhistlewhichwith wherewithal
god found him in a swer and brot him up
bign strong like a free lad, strapping
god beautiful and god awful all tgetha
and whowoulditnot favour? there is notother
the world grinds.. it finds its genos and it
grinds dem down into de dirt dat is da trudt.
it god damn good down there in godland
there where we is grinded. I am like a
little blackspasm walnut all messedup
and gooey and looking up into the big
machine which is grinding me i notice a litt
e switch tht say 'on/off' and god! i knewit
knewthat i had to press it, so reachedup
and pressedit hard hard hard and the big
machine stop.
gotup and lookabout there is nothign
there just an empty plain latte. handed
to me by a worker in the comustables
union. i take it and walk away, every day
there are more events like this until oneday
it all makes sense and i throwthe cup away.
that day i wake up. woke up, past tenst
it was a monday in dream time, in modern
time it was now now now. there is notime
carpediem and the world it gut and all is god
and here we are. still holding the cup back in
that life but in this life, all is gut all is god.
little weevil in the eye, it crept in and
trashed da place. and here we am youriamheisme
as spake the prophetess in ringtime oldago
the same blank screen on which we are today
projected last centuries had other filmns but
liek the surface of a frogpond is covered with
bugs musings and yet a deep stillness and
causal darnkness below ensures we are
tied into the truth nownagain by the undertow.
got i still hold that cup but time has movedon
world has not stood still, Hereclitus' river
δὶς ἐς τὸν αὐτὸν ποταμὸν οὐκ ἂν ἐμβαίης
still flowin on time is the wisemans ferryfoil
against pedantry, bigotry, thinking truth is 4eva
when it is neva 4eva not if you can speak it
yr tung is not eternal not even 7rs old
still less that ofthe worlds long basaltic
tounge that licks the ocean floor
marking time since the fish were new
and the waves played like children on
the edge of the sand - the slap of time's hand
soon reminds the man that he is new
and there is still a lot to do. the old ecologies
are not workign too good. the beliefs of
a tribe are not going to fit into the hightide
redefined landscape of our newly made habitat
but we can cry, there is time to cry, until
the tears are dry, and then we must fly
for each days just the same damn wisdom done again
for the firelights again against the wall shaddows
move and play and soon will be another day
bright and dark is the first division, afterwhich
the trilogy, and then the five, the seven, the eleven
and so on. when i need to collide i open my mind
and digest a pi or an e and that brings liberty
to me. then i get to take off these clothes and
dance again in the primal light, the beforenafter
shake the hand of god the creator and beliefe
for a moments slithering thoughts that all is 1
and we are unchanging moments in the great bliss
but still there must be somethign to do, some
work, it cannot all be play, there must be something
to do today? isn't there this list upon the wall and
the boots are by the door? isn't it going to matter
at all if the hay remains in the field and the oats
return to clay? who is to decide? bene moi the truth
seeker not the one who is today a gnomic urchin
not he who seeks the light, not he who is noone, undone
so there is sense in the ratting of races and suchwith
the fools will save us in the end, wasn't it always the way?
and from the clay sprouts another day
have a cup of tea and come back later there is more to say
if there was a liss lather rich way of sayingit
fannymae was a old lady now but the time got stuck
so we still put the needle in here and
turntable it around to the old vinyl crack.
so we deomonstratus thus that the old is in danew
and weknew too that it is oldbrownshoe toodleoo
to make it. and so also to break it. and fake it
but wotof the future isn't it here in it's entirety
just not all quite exactly so? exactly so. soitis
a mere fillip to extract it out and read it like a
biblos or a cribsheet and how spans the pages?
well it is build like a tree with one long taproot
and we are at that and the trap is in the longest limb
but there are others too - which one is you? they all is you
who are you? you are you but there is more than two you
there is millionsyou you just need to choose one today
then another tomorrow and so so you see to play
and spinthewheel itis necessary tosay
the knife enters theer and divides the soul the day
but both paths continue on their way and you have
a say in which one is got yr foot on but
others also gottasay so itsnotsoeasy but anyway.
stay in touch. don't forget about the correspondence
we once had. I wrote it in a frenzy but it was all true-
every drop of that blood was mine. except the drops that
that day. i closed my eye and it was fine. this letter
is from the other side it says "nice weather here
we hoped to get the boat today but missd it so
there is one tomorrow. very misty, staying inside at a
nice place that has dvorak on the radio. toodleoo"
goethe wrote a play about it too - but i can't remember
the name. it might have been set into a bede game. but
there is never clarity in these dim recollections never
any logic. reminderd of the greek arist passive or wot?
gotta getinto it that other drug, the blue glass bottle
hexagonal of finest pharmacopia was only me2you
but we got it dinit, didn'tit then, init? it was good then
and now i miss it. but the correspondence got away
from us and now i wonder where you at today..
the vehicle for these choices is the expedient minusd the
plenary. it is for such wholesome reasons that the bank
had to expellhim and he to ezra wrote "literature has writes(sic)
of itsown which extend byond uplift and recreation" so true,
the interests of literature let alone god in mind then by god
they god anotherhing coming! so peddle on, dear sire, and do
send what you have writ, for it is for the good cause that ye
write and they will never unrstand till ye are long dead, and
otherways if we are all wrong, then it will still be worth it
for no-one ever really understands the context of what they do
the branchings of the tree can go on in the background then
suddenly come to fruit, one spring day, and then we say
'ah but he had it coming' or 'he was following his hart' but
it is never really known, we just have to explore the space
we are given to work in and find its bounds and write about
them., that is what poetry is doing on the page, poets with
their lives, nothing coming between them but time and ink.
so ezra wrote bak 'i don't fully agree with your assesment
inthese things' and there was a fission, but it powered the
movement for another hundred years dontyathink? yeah.
and the ginns movement started in reactionary to this but
lets remember that they were all very well read people. x
kerouac who was a frenchman, so can be forgiven for that
gallic weakness. and if they had a task it was to blow the
whole thing open all over again, but this time it toppled the
and we must credit them that though they are now widely
despisd and unread. It was their mind to re-establish the cnxion
with the sphynx soul, that is venerable, since plato did it
not matter why we wrote, but they did do something
to put front and centre the glorious raison de etre not some
literary rag editorial well nuanced gathering nuanced dust
on some coffeetable cum theatrical bookshelf in the lobby
of the great engine room of society, high society, well read
society. and they know they know it is all ballooney but
trickle down once the ancients have started it who can stop?
it is too late to electrify the rails we are walking all over them
so better just call off the hunt, have a glass of wine, deliver
a special edition in plastic wrapped to the usual suspects
have another glass of wine declare the winner and go home.
and watt next ? some fool scribbler in the empty halls of the
abyss taking no time to shoot out some foul gambol but
isit worth reading this no no, no. take ye some lamb out into
the paddock and shoot it, tis faster this way. there is nothing
left to say. After you have done that, clean up the blobs of jello
hello. the muck, put it in the pantry. back up to the gantry, if
withall wherewithall? the most uselessesst award goes to...
YOU!
welldonesire verygoodsire don't spend it all at wonce. dunce?
youneverwereadunce didn't i say it? back when you were nobody?
? nevermind have some wine! today is the day we take it all
back and make you one of us, hope on the bus, this is where
we go, back to jericho to commit felacio with some pinnoccio
you'll read about tits in the papers, but this is the real thing
the real deal, in one ear and out the other boy-o! good-o!
and here is a blob of cash to stop up the wound, bloody big hole
that what was it a 12 bore? godawful old son, still there are
a few years left to enjoy it so let me introduce you to yr fellow ghosts.
blackening the boots of some sailor i noticed a little note
it was written by an elf and said 'step inside this crack
in the pavement and join me in a tea party' and down i went
into the seam between two moments and indeed, it was
wonderland in oz all over again. 'this is truth' said the hatter
and he laughed as he poured tea for me, over a broken kettle
left to my 17th century ancetor one william williams of penzance
so i spoke the magic word and grew again into an adult but
the myth had been irrevocably cracked. one must never sound
like an adult. that is the first law. second law, is um, eh, there is none.
and the first law can be broken if it suits a purpose. there you go son!
set for life! mix up the paint in the old tin and get painting
it might be blue it might be red but the colour down on the old
shed is perpetually brown, and if ye frown, thinkit a blessing
that the old door sags, for if it were anywayelse, we'd have
packed our bags. packed our bags, packed. our. bags.
it is neccessary to talk about poverty, in the greek sense.
when the devil intrudes into our thoughts, in an image or such,
we are at liberty to ignore it, but not so when it takes a material
form - early in the morning, the second hardest thing it is to ignore it
and so managing spillages we contest that the whole tractor
is still moving, still ploughing the field of karma, still making
us human, and is intent on burying us there among the flowers
along with the other fallen dead, wounded by past wars, sleeping
rice at a wedding we might notice the same phenomena, that
lies and bitching become absorbed into the human condition
and so continues us all in this merry way to death. for life is death.
puritans would separate the curds from the whey but which
do we throw awhay? you cannot cut off the head and call it human
likewise a good cheese may come of the bits that others spurn
and cheese with wine is a metaphor for many a flor before anow -
bywhich i mean, asper the wider theme, there is a beauty in putescence
and we do wrong to ourselves to try to be too clean - our immune
system tells us the same when spic and span leads us to inflame.
yet be merry all day and night and suffer tommorow is the law
and he who lives by the sword must die so - the evidence is sure
don't while away yr life in spam, but make yr meat into the ham
and wham and bam the leg of lamb, the poet knows his life is
short, so spend it in the lap of Dionysis - does this pleasure house
give a different view of life's importances? maybe. Or is it that his
readers would be there with him for a while and enjoy vicariously
the sweet meats? indeed, to eat them, one a line at a time, noodle
spoodle kdoodle arandudle flafoodle. what not? this pleasure house
of poemry is the overspillage of luxurious infatuous intent. it is not
going to be too much to overstate htis fractoid. there it is again
eat the poem. who in the car wants to get out? coloured pencils.
eating crayons, drinking wine and crayola. pinyata. favosites
poisonhouses. great argyle street leading to the realpolitik. tis
just so so so what is this future you will inherit? tell me boy - make
it quick.
the glass palace of the mind is prelude to peace. we live together
in a dark world, strange forces pull as this way and that, what is
good to me, may be pain to you. I collect feathers and stuff them
into a pillowcase. what is the point in seeking further without pause
to rest the head? there is a symptom of great evil which is fatherhood
manifest in the state. the state should be our mother, beneficial, bene
violent. there is no hubris worth the date of this paper.. what colour
is the mind? isn't it tangerine? yes and blue, yellow, pocket. I put
the colours in the pocket. THere are some poets that are come
to change the world. These poets are mostly unknown and sink
wout a trace, others reach some notice after they are gone. I am
thinking of an ode to my cat jeoffry, who licks his paw, and allows
one mouse in seven to escape his fate. this poet cat is the beginning
of a new movemnet in verse. The other exemplar of this, socrates, is like
a sage. poets are sages who write - theirs is the cursed invention of
language hidden in mind whorls. this is the piece de resistance. i delay.
there is nothing left for me to say. except to continue wasting time
with this diatribe. the perfect society is only a hairsbreadth away. we
must allow ourselves to inhabit our own body. the cancers must be cut
out with the sharp blade of insight. there can only be one class
of people operating societies brain. the rest are the muscle, the lungs
the wider nervous system and teh bones. to each part of the body
can be found a parallel in society. if we are to be as one, thought
as the internet being a brain, there can only be a frainscape lansey
farney har bar inciting servourtude inside the glass castle there are
lights and candles always burning, naked bodies unite in mirrors
angled towards each other, there is a thing smoke from the furnaces
burning underground, the bodies providing heat for those above
it is an utopiaric idealic fulspom articule welfarnic proteomic embolism.
the spermatazoa sent outward in spaceships - young testosterone
filled young men and feisty women - too dangerous for society to
keeps to itslef, they will be pushed outside into the blackness for
who knows forever - like seeds in the wind most will wither and die
but a few may land on a distant star and colonise it nicely. this is
what will naturally coma bout once we agree that death is not the end.
if we reframe death as a simple refolding of personality back into
the cakemix of time, then there is no real problem with genocide, or
state sponsored murder, so long as the greater good of humanity is
established. the personal cannot really be allowed to trump the
social good, so long as we are trying to establish a cohesive regime.
this probably sounds painful to those brought up to believe their
own existance is of the most supreme importance, but this narcisism
is poison to society. society does not need to protect individual's rights
instead it needs to protect itself, the greater good. Just as the body
must exterminate cancer cells, less they take hold and poison down the
entire organism. the only area where mutation is allowed is in the
gametes - individuals who wish to experiment with differentness
can be turned into sperm or egg cells and expelled to other planets
to begin new societies there based on their ideas. Individuals who
are willing to accept that they are part of a larger society will be
rewarded with an easy life - made easy by modern technology,
robotic supply chains for essential nutrients and cleaning, VR,
soma, free love (following neutering of most males) etc. if the mind
recoils at some of these ideas, it can easily be retrained.
only then willl we all be poets. the key component will be sensuality
as the basis of society. with all our needs fulfilled, there will be no
need for struggle against the odds pitched against us as individuals.
there is only room for pleasure in the new world, and with pleasure
exhausted, there will finally be peace in the jelly brain cells of the new
robot nation, anthrotopia. it may exist or it may not. they the citizens
might not even know till they put the toe in the water, didn't tow the
line, raised their heads above t parapet. that could be how it works.
although if one can't question the head of all power, is there any point
in anything else? isn't it all "mere detail" perhaps itis. flabergasted byit.

!

nothing!

lemuria (fragments)

place beads
there
the god wakes
our supra rational deity.
what makes her fat?
is it fantasy?
let εἰκών flow with milk

noo noo noo
moo moo moo

iguana milk mother
open the door
to zirconia
stars inside, so many stars..

a reamble pulse
sort of bean
gag her hundred times
times hundred
times

foogoo gigoplax
nigod dogod godog

yess yes this mind
has become
mushy.

*

the dark chords and tendons
that prop up my corpid form
leave hollow
the body of an instrument
the shell to sound the wind
a pulse flickering
like the pilot light
on an interstellar beacon
ducking on wave mountains
dripping in flecked foam

*

got a shuffle on.
got a shuffle on.
like argonauts
gracious,
loopy
being labelled.

microidia fabulous
inhabitants
of genomes and
present day cityscalps

embolism microbe
moist unweathered
fast fracula.

the true cubit macro
calculated to cut into
a metronome node
tuned into classic radio

instant argillaceous gravels
nematodes and flatworms
the horns of a ram
entombed into stone: a trident

the last latex Renault
hung like Foucault
got to go..
.. into a tar-pit

firefly

little pyre in the air
flying around the marijuana grove
I like to catch you - but there!
it is only a mote in my eye!

my hands buzz
with insects as I cage them
in a lair of fingers
sawdust words grind
in the gaps between teeth
tongue puckers making
the probability of foolish sayings
so inevitable

Linji - !
slap me down

when host and guest
are the same
all the scriptures
burst into flame

whisk me
into foam

there - that spark
I drown
chasing it down

go to breathe -
my feet in my mouth!

one monk is always
on the way

another is always
in the way

which is the reflection of the other?

"aged rustics sing songs
the rule of the sovereign
pervades the land"

these leisures
cannot last forever
but time
lasts nearly as long
as the aftertaste

cauldron eyes

I am sucked into you
like a zygote into a dark cauldron
the briefest spasms seek to get out
but relent so easily
cos it is too too too nice you see

three seasons

what did we start?
a fire blown up
fierce and bright
it burned through the world
left it smouldering
with a buried heat

it was then light as clouds
in a yellow sky
after summer rain has passed
sweet as
the promise of blossoms
rich as the pomegranate
on Menoikeus' tomb

now it is firm as bone
tough as sinew
as elemental
as earth
as old
as time
as simple and certain
as death

each a season of love

from the great fire
are new sprouts
three, growing fast
to young new trees

the rich harvest
and endless bounty
of artless frivolity

tuggas girl

she doesn't need
the needle in her hand

an accent
is what shoots up her nose
like a snort of ammonia

cold bus interchange
then walk the citywalk

the skidding black curly haired
translucent ectomorph
with one heel broken off

but on poor shoes
she learnt to balance
long ago

care is
tossed away
like paper on christmas day

tourniquet tinsel
mouthparts
tighten to eat and shit

a husband
of hers
he has well disciplined
(defensive) hands

a fluorescent
yellow jacket
pauses
opening a fridge door
in the beer store

untie the knots
left over
after the jackhammer

down the coast
lazily casting lines
hooks and reels in a storm


bluebottles
wash onto the beach
in dying drifts

each one opens
its tiny mouth
as if to sing

walking down the sandy mile
she collects soap bubbles
into a bucket for him

"wuchit thay sting"
she says tenderly

ocean born and delivered
released
from the string

the purple patterns
every inch
of exposed skin

not even ironic

The Ἅγονος of Ἰωάννης (The Agony of John
or, Lines Rediscovered in a Mind Ploughed Cellar)
 

A lily on papyrus blooms

such as these

 lines in a mind-ploughed cellar

the lie undiscovered

by fools who brush quickly

past a text

we here make almost decipherable

the description of an ancient stillborn:

*

PART I

The first cause : an argument begins

The first division : and the argument is with God

Ergo, the Trinity: and the argument is about God.

there is no gas

 to fame

no odour

 to ardour

like to a drunken bird

flying seems absurd

although its built for it

the wing and air don't fit

now the baby has the pencil

and is endorsing it with dribble

I hope she does not get a splinter

though my hands are full of them; it's winter

when I lived in Venice

I never used my penis

though I heard others use ‘em

when I wasn't sleeping

this in the evening

when into a boat stealing

I lapped the night air ringing

with the maiden's si-si-singing

and lonely contemplating

but *never* masturbating

All things through Him emerged and Eternity is made fertile:

and from this springs Matter, and the Division, and so the Path.

The wild and lonely road

is sometimes skipped, sometimes tiptoed

and though I was a long time on it

my head was always stuck under the bonnet

not picking the fruity trees passed by

as so few ladies held my desperate eye

but there was one, more enterprising

at a youth hostel in Saarbrücken rising

a breakfast, fruit and pumpernickel

was enough to get us amicable

we had a passion on the spot

a nice change from my lonesome grot

and though she later tried to get away

I followed her back home to stay

alas the magic of the breakfast table

despite my hunger was unrepeatable

so back to Saarbrucken swam I

and came upon a Kṛṣṇa swami

(this after a long diversion

when I was a barrista in London

 and later was a tramp or bum

which was a sort of perversion

and somehow got arrested and deported

for sleeping rough without passaporte)

but anyway the Kṛṣṇa man

was from a distant Kṛṣṇa clan

and through him fate directed me

to travel off to Hungary

the road was crazy never straight

and sleeping in a field one night with snakes

I found the answer to my dreams

in balmy moonlit cloud triremes

all floating there in heavns bower

experienced a lifetime in an hour

this was at a place near lake Balaton

and when my food ran out I moved on

the Kṛṣṇas, innocent and wise

yet cleverly operate a disguise

a rural idyll simple on the surface

has more erudite a purpose

the devotee is the good folk there

it is the gurus that bleed despair

I think that any faithful hierarchy

decays soon into oligarchy

for faith cannot be tested really

this is the perpetual query

and as its nice on top pretend

that all is for some higher end

- but let me hop forward to

the next bit as I'm boring you

PART II

morning glory

awake and sore

the far flung

folded flannel

 falls over the floor

God and subject contemplate each other as human life emerges

Each appears to the other as beauty, to light the darkness

So where will I now take up the story

my next adventures were in Italy (that's easy)

but what was my purpose in all of this

of course it was Nirvana - Sat Chit Ananda - bliss

but though I had this singleminded aim

I had to get on in the world the same

what challenges face one in this questa?

seeking Nirvana but discovering Siesta

so here we go again in pentameter time

at least as long as I can make it rhyme

my rule is truth but in those last few inches

I was a bit unkind toward the Kṛṣṇas

I turned the earth of that sweet Krisna Völgy

all that summer, took prasad and ghee

a mataji and prabhuji young in love are talking

and me on the muck heap with Gábor forking

or on a cart pulled by two white oxen

and leafing through the Srimad Bagavatan

sitting in the sunflowers, fantasising yonis

smoking wild hemp, eating poppies

I watched the big wild storms build on the lake

then roll over us casting destruction's wake

we bathed the gods in milk, sang and clashed

like eleusinian mysteries the Christians trashed

not that different fundamentally

although fundamentalists would disagree

something lives on in deep memory -

as the love still shown to icons Jesu, Mary

represented so finely in a figurine

Psyche still works her magic doctrine

like one day when explaining to a devotee

I cast a magic spell, a stick got hooked on a tree

hot honey milk and sun illusioned skin

and beans and blinking I was on the road again

But they are unable to touch each other - yet the darkness was not overcome

What was I doing? if only I could find it

not this, not this - I must resolve alone to sit

I was always looking for my mountain

ah, that bliss of looking, it was a fountain

instead I found a nice inviting cave

on hills above the Adriatic - the waves

deep below on that surface wandered

also my thoughts I sat and pondered

the limestone grew hot as time swam about me

shaded by an oak tree life remained a mystery

with just a bowl spoon blanket and my diary

in a cave I wrote verse blank and dreary

spent two weeks in there, read Lear

(had no better friend back then than S'pere)

observed life without colluding in it

counted all the heartbeats in a minute

condensed the mind into a speck of gold

but all to soon eternity felt old

I took to walking on the hills above Trieste

in forest I came upon a ruined terrace

stairs and chambers weedy broken down

the remains of some long abandoned town

then taking up my bag I caught the train

and sailed across the lagoon to Venice came

and there well I have already related one

amusement contemplated not done

and never had two coins to supervise

but just one card to maximise

(money such a satisfying thing

it maintains illusions of fitting in

I'd never doubt myself if I had cash

but all of that might vanish in a flash)

What is the point of all this rhyme?

I wish I could amuse you - one last time

A voice speaks: I, Iohanes am witness to that light (but I am not the light)

dive in, dive in

the illumination might begin

before I turn away

who can say

   or should I leave it?

the air is in the room now - breathe it

The devils are created (though He made the world...)

The depths of loneliness are deep

but friends inhabited my sleep

and Self becomes the greatest friend of all

the comforter the tutor and the call

so ever deeper we must go

till Self becomes the only friend we know

this is no literary trope

there is no literature, I hope

that touches on the Self

as wind that touches smoke..

in Perugia (much later) in a garden

I met a wallflower from Brixton

and that evening on the rooftop bower

she told me that her aunty had been Lennon's lover

and gave a little beetle to prove the lay

so I knew Lennon too in that particular way

but I didn't know what else to say

so it always is with me right to this day

the boat left the harbour with me not on it

alone on the shore oh getonwithit

loneliness stands a moment in the door

then goes inside, is heard from, nevermore

Through the doubts and ignorance of humans, the world does not know him

So in the Academia I went to see

the image of the great St Antony

in a cave like mine he endured an agony

but was adored and had obtained a degree

of enlightenment or whatever it was calling

though now his actions seem to us appalling

inspired I sought perfection it was only that -

oh but for a cup of tea and a cat!

no no perfection was the only thing!

and then I found a boat to sleep in

remember I was tipped out of that dreamin'

by the infanta's nearby screamin'

next day to Rome - there I met my family

and watched a lady touch herself intimately

in the room below ours though a gauze

and quietly clapped my own applause

PART III

All the angels are created, except for the children

Summer was now in bloom in me

and everything was nearing acme

but due to some miscalculation

I missed a tenuous bus connection

and again found just a scrubby bed

a patch of earth to lay my head

on a clay hill above the station

(they never rest who seek salvation)

the long evening gown she hauls

a starry smock for out of doors

out of their dark clustered wells

are disinterred galaxies, milk and jewels

gazing upward all that night eclipses

a thousand fiery apocalypses

each inferno flung outward bound

and by a gulf in time unwound

the trinities, dualities

like fruit, or tiny fireflies

but why there is no mystery Hera

was all explained - in India

explained so as to be unfathomable

knowledge is a guess; faith abominable

Justice: prudence, Truth unconscionable

the Creator: clearly unaccountable

so at Arunachala so; just so

where it began 9 moons ago

the course was set  - released the fire

burnt up all the karma - the pyre

on the mountainside was lit

but I have not told you of that yet

the famousesest story of all

was written in a Vedic hall

that culture against adversity

founded a magnificent university

it was the dawn and glory came

or wisdom in another name

the 'universe' she seeds these things

those arts of the awakened beings

the magical library of the sages

collected seeds from many ages

planted for all time the Bodhi tree

and sitting in the shade was me

that juice - that nectar - that I found

in India it rises from the ground

my journey there was stupid; simple

I was as old as my first pimple

and walking by the mountain Stupa

emerged from too irrational a pupa

into a world made contradictory

- and so began my ditchling journey

Children are born through our hopes and dreams, and they know nothing of the blood and desire from which they sprung

Matera where I finally caught that bus

was waiting all laid out for us

just like a dream and as expected rare

as some drunk town planner's dare

and Escher angles taught the streets

the stairs descend in cool heartbeats

blank holes where people used to dwell

carved by thousands into the hill

My plan - to find a cave and, well,

just burn my eyes into the wall

but dusk was drawing - dogs were barking

and getting lost a hostel waiting

I found a friendly bunk and fellows

help to ease the curse of sorrows

an accent not too unfamiliar

heyu ahlle am frum Virginia

bleu perple pink green owrege

on my bunk peeping off the edge

I spy a girl adulterated - real

from where people really talk and feel

and cannot say about the truth

that it might be lacking proof

but dive in plain and rude as breath

unbounded life is merely death

so in the morn I found my cave

(the limestone one, not what I craved

at every step of my adventure

trying to hide a moral dementia)

it was a room above a stair

everything I'd need was there

a place for me to sit

a wall at which to stare

enlightenment would certainly

happen to me there!

ah if only I'd known the irony

with which I'd recount this later

- I soon knew what I was staring at.

And so by a childlike faith, we still believe that we are saved by God's will alone.

later I walked up to the church above the town

and watched a procession in which a huge

cross was borne into the street. Children everywhere.

I had bought some olives and bread and watched

the embrace of an old ritual, their fine clothes, black

in the South Italian sun burning on icons, monks.

Finding the shade of a lone eucalypt I remembered

the familiar hills far away, and told myself

I had just a little left, just a little wine, and a little time.

It will get me all the same, the same end I sought

today is always there. There is no difference if I delay.

It is always today today -

(but what a foolish facile thing to say)