Corners painted black

Imagination brushes up against reality, its corners painted black

A crispness of asperity just rounded-up in a ball of cotton

And then there are sins.

The sloth, the envy

The gluttonous man

A decoration of frugal temporary edge to an unedgy universe

To a most likely round infinity with its corners painted black

I have no wish to confess any sins, Father, and so

I’m back. I very much respect them, these sins of mine

An alphabet of sorrow that’s written piece by piece the song of the

Divine with no shaped regulations, just light, and dark, and shades

And memory slowly fades

It is the hill atop of which the vision gets the clearest and then the night

Will come, its corners clawed in black. The dark, deep, low embrace

That fills the heart with grace

Will sing of my return

I am not dead

I’m back.

Shut down the Sun

Shut down the Sun, it’s way past bedtime

And all the stars are out drinking

The void, the plasma, the liquids of the universe

Dance to the tune.

Shut down the Sun, tired as it is, the mighty ball

of Fire, let’s be ecologically friendly, leave the old chap

To relax for a while, all in all it’s been a long enough day,

Some may say it’s been longest. Nurse, what about that pill

That will turn off the light, don’t you say?

G.

Soldier Son

The other kids mocked me, they called me names

Heathen – they said, your mother is a whore

And your daddy’s the son of a whore. I did not listen

Who cares what everybody says? But I bled on the inside

I bled beneath the walls behind which I was hiding

In plain daylight. They called me Shaptir, spat sunflower

Seeds on my cheek. It is stained in my being, the root

of Anger, powerless that I am I am still attempting to smile. One night

I was returning home when three of them appeared at one corner

I did not want to fight. The chased me. Muslim scum, they cried

Desperately I was trying to find the right place to hide.

My dog tried to protect me, so they killed my dog.

Darkness tried to protect me, so they killed my darkness.

God tried to protect me

They killed my God.

But these are not tears, and I – I am not sad. I am rested

I am Vengeance.

I am Ready.

G.

The Unknown Citizen (W.H. Auden)

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be

One against whom there was no official complaint,

And all the reports on his conduct agree

That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a

saint,

For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.

Except for the War till the day he retired

He worked in a factory and never got fired,

But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.

Yet he wasn’t a scab or odd in his views,

For his Union reports that he paid his dues,

(Our report on his Union shows it was sound)

And our Social Psychology workers found

That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.

The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day

And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.

Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,

And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured.

Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare

He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment Plan

And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,

A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.

Our researchers into Public Opinion are content

That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;

When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went.

He was married and added five children to the population,

Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his

generation.

And our teachers report that he never interfered with their

education.

Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:

Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

A Divine Image (William Blake)

Cruelty has a human heart,
And Jealousy a human face;
Terror the human form divine,
And secrecy the human dress.

The human dress is forged iron,
The human form a fiery forge,
The human face a furnace seal’d,
The human heart its hungry gorge.