talk to the rocks

they know the answer
didn't they see
five hundred million years
of time flow past just now?

time cuts
then licks the wound
don't frown
it is happening even now

the taste
and the stone
go together
like clock pieces

mechanically
grinding away
to an unknowable end

amoeba curlicue abacus

each prick
- be it a little devil or jesus -
i believe in it.

this beans me

argyle cafe, 1994
some lonesome hic
walks in

wants to see the figures
but we only got
racing details from yesterday
so it all breaks up
into pansy -
out on the street

golf got fried otter
on his club
had it taken away
egg on the lazy susan
mayo on the thai
bar friend on the owl
what a
fabulous way to die


one whole in won
owned them all
like an archangel
changed them
into the unremarkable
belfry gargoyle

vomiting stone
into a garden well

laughter
is
a
burbling
sound

forever
after

like wind

growth rings

look
at me

each line
marks the
dead flesh

the opening
up of the heartwood
with a sharp axe

shows it
extends
backwards

to the
seed

Obiturary

The passing of Inchiki

Crowd crowd crowd

My mental tapestry

With stitched faces

Loose threads come

From the eye, the tooth

The door, the wardrobe

Wherever we start

Each when pulled it

Unravels the world

Carelessly into string

Inchiki was not of this world. He came from some other place where delicate creatures thrive.

Forever youthful, he did not marry like I married.

I wish I had known him better, before he died.

He liked to dress in drag, or walk naked in parks.

His laughter was a bit unhinged, like a butterfly dancing on a leaf.

We were all there at the funeral, PreciousNing, the two Alex’s, the Owl, the Wanderer, Yellow Vincent, Spinal, his family and other friends, and a few who seemed like urban bohemian Bums.

His oldest friend Mr Swann threw some red roses on the coffin and we carried it out to the cemetery.

There was a bird twittering in a tree and it made me think of Inchiki, forever young.

His voice will not be silent though he is dead. He is not like others of us who breathe air.

RIP Inchiki.

{Alaric Jones}