My mound was effectively to meet a poet

                                 with connections

High up in the food chain - that is a tad wicked

Of me i must admit    In any case i imagine

He would have sat right where you are sitting now    A

Maverick lump if ever there was one    “Evolution is creative

Not because”    “Do not believe in attention

That is not worth escaping    Gulping majesty”    “Of a white night

In lonely recesses of the maze who knows but that

I do not peel it away    Forcing myself

To look upon that which others merely recognize

And do not see    This atrocious hairpiece etc”    Go ahead

Snigger if it makes you feel better    But then ask yourself

What am i not

A turgid member of    Am i not every bit as fatally

Embrangled in these treacherous paraphernalia    Have i not

Myself on occasion found it rather cosy    All of us

Ghouls together    Giving life a bad name    Love

A bad reputation    Corpses

Their mysterious savour    Not that we literally devour them

These days    Any more than a housewife literally devours

The daytime soap    Impales herself with any splendid object

Brought down from the mantle    No    The fact is it simply

Never happens    What is more none would ever dream of it

Dunking a cream biscuit in a nice cup of tea

Which is permissable when alone in front of the television screen    I

Must insist you do not know her at all    Neither the frecklefaced

Lad out in the street aiming stones at an indistinct sky    In his

Own way alive to what gathers in the cracks of things    Yet distracted

For a moment by a distant bell ringing more slowly than is necessary

My mound was all set for a lazy jaunt

Down memory lane - things were going nicely until

Without warning a deleterious chord rang out

& you recognized the shameful haircut reflected back at you

From the store window to be your own    But as luck would have it

There you were on the doorstep of the premises of a trader

Of fancy goods    Who just so happened to specialize

In quality affordable millinery    Only it turned out to be not the kind

Of affordable you were thinking of    Fortunately

A somewhat rickety occasional table near the entrance

Offered a range of pre owned items    Yet at closer

Inspection there was not a single one among them

Which would have looked out of place in a police photograph

Of some texas whorehouse massacre    After humming & hahing

A good while you finally plucked up the courage

To turn your face away & thrust in a hand    Upon edging back

To the counter you were relieved to note the jaded air

Of the proprietor    Who might have assumed your selection

To be a gift    Perhaps for a crazy

Old aunt    It was not until you found yourself once again

Out in the street that it dawned on you    The very handsome

Brown paper bag which carried your purchase would make a far

Superior alternative    You quickly ditched its contents

Fashioned a pair of eye holes in it & put it on    And at last

With the crisis alleviated a welcome sense of normalcy

& predictability returned to the town    Oh look    That funny little shack

With smoke curling from the chimney    So well known & loved by you

As a child    You rush to the window & peer inside    Sure enough

There is uncle darby receiving a blow job from his junkie girlfriend

Joan    Eyes glued to the television set    Another member of the family

My mound stumbles down to breakfast looking like

Something out of a madhouse etching - damned

If i know exactly what    For if the lines of tension are

Marvellous there is precious little else to go on    If the

                              boiled egg is topped distractedly

It is only to ensure the abyssal yolk doesnt swallow a fellow

Whole    Then one must devour it all at once for the voices

Sake    Before the men in diagnosticians hats appear pro

Nouncing an acute case of dulcet strain    Quickly crush the

Fragile empty shell into many fragments    You alone see

How one with infinite care might come to assemble such

Tiny shards into a kind of horn    Put on a nankeen jacket

As you approach the end of any sartorial life you could

Control    These grimaces are less incongruous than is at

First supposed    But toot gently    It will produce only that

Impossible lost note drifting between intervals   Practice

Makes torpid    Do these demons never remove their masks

Of apparent thoughtfulness    Indeed they do & a lot more

Besides    Then they dance around as if seized by conflicting

& transient  impulses    One takes another aside offering a

Guided tour of the toponyms dotted across his torso &

Buttocks   Molindone    Spiroperidol    Thiothixene    Thems

Some purdy names beams his companion    Only beware

The first resumes    Venture not into the matted hairy wilds

As they are haunted by the balloon folk    Whose king has a

Greatly long & narrow head expressive of insupportable

Dolor    If anyone asks tell them your name is herminet   

That you were born an inquisitive little bourgeoise for

Whom weird experiences are not enough    At that they will

Invite you to supper    Which you can hardly decline

Then a salt cellar will be pushed toward you

My mound pierces these shitty showers like a songbird

Does knowledge of mischief - there we were thinking it was all about

Heaven driving us mad through the loudspeaker    When verily

                                       it came to pass that a crooked stool

Did nicely    Though none could say how    Some perspired profusely

In the attempt to tell    Others eyes grew close together    And all

Was weathering & metamorphism    Sudden insights

At knife point    Scribbling to keep warm

Or induce euphoria    Still others called for mass resignations

Filterings into the halted traffic of a proud people

Inhaling fumes given off by various solvents    Then another throng

Appeared out of the sand    Upon which those present jumped back exclaiming

Crikey where did youse come from    To which came the reply

Yeah nah we couldnt help overhearing your fascinating & well informed

Discussion of adhesives petrol & butane gas in cigarette lighter

Refills    And by the way isnt it a sad sort of irony

Given that the ones who are doomed to wait want most

For the grace to do so    We dont doubt that in their place

We too would adopt a practice that damages the brain

And the lungs & can be fatal    Sure seems preferable

To training all of our desire upon an unknown or unspecified

Miraculousness of the future    If this is truly

One of our options in the current impasse    At that

The palpable gloominess of the scene seemed to become interesting

For hildegards pet tailless amphibian

With a short squat head & body & moist skin

Throbbing in her cleavage like some gross externalized organ

Emitting the foul chirrup of approval & enjoyment of the bare title

Of its office without accompanying duties    Love makes a bacillus

It seemed to be saying    But you are damned if you will fetch it

My mound wants only for the name of a creation

Or creature that destroys its creator - something to turn

The head in a room full of odalisques

& entrepreneurs    A nom de guerre to go

With cacophanous looks    Bony crests    Bright blue &

Red raw naked skin on the neck    Long bristle like black

Feathers    Dagger like claws    A pair of sunglasses

Found on a lonely park bench    The kind that never are lost

But are left behind on purpose    As a last resort

Given the seriousness & hopelessness of a situation

That each of us in his or her own way may wonder at

While never coming grasp in its arcane meaning    My own

Sorry tale relates to an accursed phial

Which came into my possession as a result of my penning

An innocent fan letter to a certain archdruid    May heaven heap

                                     the tic douleureux upon my forehead

If i ever do that again    For now i am burdened with this

Odious object until i can unravel the secret of some humbug

Which will invest me with the power to palm it off

On some other dozy twat    And it is all so senseless

& silly    But that is precisely

How it works    I feel its weight in my cloak pocket & shudder

At the realization that it is sheer numskullduggery

That animates this hapless orb    Grinds away

An infernal barrel organ    While we frisk

Evil capuchins    The evening crowds hurry by

With nary a sidelong glance    Athletes    Vegetarians    Women

Of childbearing age    If only he could send a message

To urge them to carry on this way    Look ahead & keep moving    Do not

Pause to affect a passing interest in that which obsesses you

My mound returns the venom - with interest    The lips

Are not exactly pursed    The eyes askance speak

Of modes of indirection as if they represent

Some kind of hone    Ergo one wanders away into the night

Dropping apart slice by slice    Meets gruesome death

With a grin that is not so readily ascribable    How did it happen

The citizenry want to know    We were content with glances

Loaded with suspicion & disapproval    Mothers entreating

Their children to come way    Quickly darling    Now we are as if

Trapped outside with each other    Some handle or other

                                                  once so sophisticated

Having broken off in our frantic mitts    Tones seem far off

& not at all descriptive    People call to each other in the streets

In garbled incomprehensible phrases    I mean

“Birdshitcoloredmotherfucker” could mean anything    Then an

Old acquaintance dawdles past a couple of times    Guessing at last

That he is simply too slow to recognize    It is the same story

All over    They say our horizons are reduced    There is room enough only

For a coin operated machine    Which is forever in the process of being

Vandalized    Now it turns out to have been awful of us to want so much

To be coddled    Why it has become for us in these times the zenith

Of all opprobria    Others say nadir    Whatever    On & on

As if nothing else matters    Keep putting up todays posters

Over yesterdays posters    Soon the credits will roll    The lights go up

& a gaunt youth sidle out of nowhere feigning to deal with

The detritus left in our wake    One look at his face tells us

He is paid to show    Not to give a shit    For at his age

He knows the score    One of the buddies always dies in the end    Leaving

The other holding a bucket full of glue    There is even a song about it    This

Chary everything    Hanging over our heads like a universal pall

My mound took it upon itself to see

                                        for us all

From the point of view of an impeccable avalanche -

And anyway

Who ever escaped to their fate

Out of some era or other as the first known

Fossil of homo erectus    As if one could blot it out forever

With a life that is painfully just    Banished

Or marked for deletion by a row of dots    What went before

Was indeed bloody and mournful    But we have lost more than that

In this dancing element    I takes off

Me perforated lid to thee lady    May i have the honor

Of twitching in thy presence    I were caused to drink

By a wacky existence that leads into mystical foreclosure    Plus

By an empty neck    Then let me perform for you

My impersonation of a leaf

Which mimics a cowering animal    We need only

Wait for me to run out of breath    What an argument i am

For observing the forbidden degrees    All the world is but a position

In which one is noticeable    Sprinkled with infinitesimal openings

Which are naturally occuring    Only today

The skyline is often forced    Youth & enthusiasm

Fall short    Is that me still yapping away    Can i not get this

Imaginary dumping ground through my thick skull    Of course

Our word sky derives from their word meaning cloud    As

Our word cloud derives from their word meaning hill

Or mass of rock    Yet as much as human beings loathe

To dine side by side in this brasserie it is

A moving stratagem    How to pull it off with no small amount

Of blinking doth confound    This sometime limb    Hath no fellow

My mound ne regrette rien - the identical moves

Until you crack    She has one or two problems with it

Which she can tell you about herself    Cest normal

Meanwhile our starveling philosopher at the banquet

Comes & goes    Wondering what

The gravy knows    Lost without accent

Of elision or vestigial horns to speak of    Phoenixes

Arrive    Next a yellow dragon    Tis a pity

What depends upon it    A happy accident should care

Survive its sheer whateverness    Oh unanswerable

Crease    Dont let on that they have never lived

                                                    to sneak

Barefoot over warm stones in the night    No snapshots

Of it change hands for a small fee    A couple of bucks

A tuneful fart    A smudgy sunset    That narcotic feeling

Of drifting listening to your own voice

In the distance not really paying attention

To the fuming abyss mingled with cries of birds

Circling    Swell party    Ill have another african nipple

Easy on the cream    Oh sure writings a cinch its typing

Thats hard    Who invites this matchless bum polishing off

The parlous swanning around marrying treacherous hints to

Dreamy openendedness    I liked kissing you    Her voice became an

Icy drawl    Take me away from here    If you will be so kind    Im

Quite sure id like to go home    Truly the way of heaven is subtle &

Obscure    My heart is like pine & cypress    But what is your heart

Like    Now whenever i think of them these things are remote & of

No consequence    Before the flowers open i often look to see if they

Are open    You touch the willows and make a new green    But the

Burning branch clung stubbornly to his tail

My mound is tickled by a politics of vanity - furrily

The tongues wag    I shouldnt wonder the way

You are behaving in an unusually distracted dazed or wild manner

As if affected by the moon    Blue impulses are abroad    Lets go

Skinnydipping    But then life had already sneaked away

With the power to dapple    From a dance so decorous

No flatfooted adjective could have failed

To do it justice    Then i guess it is home to dispose of

Fleas in the candles blaze    Perhaps some other day

On the lake or lagoon we will panic suddenly

In expectation of a world forever altered

Upon the shore    BACK IN A FLASH

Read the note discovered only many years thence    Why

We are not rotten is beyond us    No

It is behind    Discharging a stream

Of burning liquid    He snoozes in his notebook

Hence the graphite smudges on his cheek & temple    In his dream

                                                         of cavernous acclaim

A bottle bobbed by

Energetically stopped with an outsized cork    One

Prodigious pop later & he was mulling over the “content”

Of some “message”    Dear barky

Leave those ducks alone theres a good boy    As for

The rest of you    Be advised that i shall refuse

To be recognized in any afterlife    And if i can assist

In any way dont bank on it    Your friend in theory

Martin c    Ps looking forward to the fire

At both disembodied ends    Who never heard his own piteous moaning

From a far flung corner of the realm    By inches obsolescing

My mound is really funny - oh did you make that up

All by yourself    They sneer

Out of the whirlwind    A horse with a beak    Reefer

Does wonders for it    Hey dionysus    Weve changed

Our minds    Give us some of those lollies or ices

Or whatever you call em    You old wag    The way you gobble

All those pills & wash em down w/ hot coffee

                         fills us w/ amazement & terror

Such as to prostrate our senses    Cool    And that

Handle bar moustache of yours really kicks ass too    What else

You got in that bag o tricks    No new dreaded lurgies

We aint heard about    Shit requiring the professional skills

Of  a registered nurse in a g string    And so on

& so forth till the hairy butterball daydreaming

Dangling a hose over his front lawn

Finally keels over    Then the chinese whispers start to

Kick in    I hear they are saying it was the poetical equivalent

Of myocardial infarction    So naturally i fly to the side

Of his widow priscilla    She manages to come on to me

Through the tears    Saying she knows what it was took her

Ralphy    But her lips cant describe it    I make no comment

Other than to offer my deepest condolences

& to run a mower over the yard for her

On a fortnightly basis    You know how it is    Small

Potatoes    Maybe that isnt the right expression    But at a time

Like this you make do with whats at hand    Or you invite her

To come for a drive with you sometime    You can park up at

The lookout & er …    Look out over the peaceful pretty town

Below    What a howler    Get a load of em sitting there    Holding

Life at arms length    Only to wake up tomorrow friends of the slab