Tuesday 27 October 2009

quiet

quiet, the bamboo grove...
from each drooping leaf-tip hangs
a drooping dew-drop

*****

Sunday 25 October 2009

steering thought

thought is like a drum:
all it wants is a cue,
then it gets going
dum, dum, dum,
tridudum, dum, dum,
dum, tridudum, dum, dum.

it's also like my old car,
it may sail along blind to the truck
rushing round the corner.

shaken, what do i do?

i turn myself into the car,
its flanks are my flanks as well,
the throttle of its engine is my breathing.

now it's quite the same
as when we used to run
marathons,
starting off in a pack--
at the sound of the gunshot--
through the city traffic.

we don't nudge one another,
we don't step on one another's shoes;
we run listening to one another,
listening to the patter of our shoes
on the road,
listening to our breathing;
and gradually,
pulling off from the pack,
into the villages,
listening just to one breathing,
listening to the bounce of just one pair of feet...
on spring cushion.

*****

Friday 23 October 2009

kingfisher

the kingfisher
stalls'n rolls
into a blue bolt,
shoots into the pond'n
shoots
up into the sunlight, fleeing
a sprinkle of words
on water, holding
in its beak, flapping,
me!

***

Saturday 17 October 2009

modern haiku

how aloof his pose!
up my friend's clean shirt collar,
a beetle!...should i?

*****

Tuesday 13 October 2009

tunnel

as the barber clips my hair,
there is a mirror on the wall,
there is a mirror at the back.
wedged in between,
i reel
into a tunnel of faces,
all similar!

they smile together,
wink their left eyes together,
scratch their noses together--
so cocksure
in their conspiracy together.
who, who might have done the crime?

an eye-witness,
called to a strange identification parade,
i peer at each face,
matching it with the memory of a shadow
folding into a row of shadows.

"the beard, shall we take it off," the barber asks.
"no, let it stay," i tell him.

*****

Monday 5 October 2009

how i write poetry

on waking up each morning i climb the rock
overlooking the valley and sit light
with the gun resting on my knees
for the poem to step into the clearing.

when it does,
i hold my breath,
take a good aim,
and pull the trigger.

*****

Sunday 4 October 2009

deliberate

as dangerous as the cat,
back to the wall,
bristling, claws drawn out,
canines hushed, whiskers on fire,
tail sticking up,
like a deliberate finger,
wagging,
no, no, no, no, no,
it won't do,
it won't do at all.

*****

Saturday 3 October 2009

black and white

a hundred crows flutter
in a cawing cawing flutter
they wing
up and down and up and down and round
the crow
gleamy-eyed
shiny-feathered
lying on the warm sand
under the sun

***