November's End

Christmas muzak

Wordless for the moment

Cold crisp air

Northern hemisphere

Snowless sidewalks

Booted girls in long coats

Scarf-wrapped boys go capless

Frogs slumber in cold mud

Spider eggs start ticking down to spring

Leaves stripped from branches

Cluttering the streets

Outside the newly wrapped windows

Where kerosene burns the first time

At dark suppertimes

Or reading a book in bed

Before cold mud slumber

Wakes to work in the chill morning

Downcast

Jogging home at night

Look for million dollar bills

No one ever drops

Jetlagged Soul

I am here

Body still shaking from the phantom plane

Soul still in transit

Walking the path my meatsack flew

ETA before the weekend hopefully

RAukland

The hippiest hip

On the global edge

The worst whites can do

To a bird of paradise

Tattooed, cow-pierced

Bare-footed skateboarder

Too good to work

Not too good to beg for smokes

Or camp protesting in a park

The Maori are still there

Driving buses

Delivering freight

Not really bothered

By the white waves that wash over them

Or the neon Chinese characters

They still see

Paradise there

Under asphalt and traffic lights

Asians and arabs

Arrived and living life

Working hard and smiling hard

Sending their kids to school

Speaking slacker English

Fighting tournaments in internet cafes

Speaking 8 languages to the clients

As they work in their father’s store

Or smoke and chat and run their own

Strange city

Palm trees and gigantic trees

Frozen still behind Victorian brownstones

And walking parks

Buses hurtling up and over

The hills to Queen street

Where she has never been

Where I another strange wanderer

Trudge past your chic shops and beer stores

Born in the North

My Californian friend
Sat in the sunlight and said
“Get one of those avocados”

I knew but I did not know
What he meant
And shamefully asked
What was an avocado
And how did you eat it

This is what it means
To be born in the North

My Indian friend
Cooking with me said
“Throw those brown leaves out”

I knew but refused to know
What he intended
I carefully hid the leaves
In the cooking pot
And we both ate them

This is what it means
To be born in the North

My Japanese wife
Took out her parasol and said
“You should get out of the sunlight”

She knew but did not know
What it meant
To innocently ask
A body starved for warmth
To deprive itself of sun

This is what it means
To be born in the North

Friday Night Sound

Rubbery screech and metal crump

Voices raise in ire

Banshee red siren

Subtle burble of smoking men

Click clack of heels

High pitched hyena laugh

Tinny rock muzak

Early carols

Cellophane snap and change jingle

Deflocked

People keep on being sheep

So long as they worship shepherds

They won’t even make a peep

As to the block they’re lured

Dirty looks from stone age books

Keep our bodies in chains

That we learn to hate ourselves

Is as inane as it is insane

Fear Big Daddy in the sky

More than Big Brother on earth

Both turn us into children

Both tell us what we’re worth

Given choice of hells they sell

In this life or after it

No matter how they sing and dance well

I politely refuse to buy any of it

Fall Rest

Go you to bed

Sweet mothering earth

We treat you much less

Than you are worth

We bully and torture

Take all your best

Now your seasons have turned

So off to your rest

Off now to slumber

Beneath sheets of white

We cannot stop you

You have the right

While with woodland folk

Your brown body lays dreaming

We will rest too

From out cutting and reaming

Give gifts from your bosom

Stamped with love brotherly

The one time of the year

We act with humanity

I will miss your beauty

But I am glad you will go

Would that I could sleep with you

Nestled beneath the snows

In Morning

Lonely mouse myself

Slides the shoji with no thump

Pulling clothes on pantomime

Takes me twice the time

To ready myself for work

And slip out the door

Terminal autumn sun caresses

Like an older parent

Asshole-in-face waiting

Then asshole-in-face riding

Bang my head

Searching for change

At the office

Second hand dead man’s shirt

And frayed clown shoes

No tie never nowadays

When I’m safely in the pen

Until slaughtering time

Morning Self

In the morning

After you fully awake

And your mind’s eye opens

Like the orange iris of a lotus blossom

You know

Which fingernail is too long

Which hairs need cutting

Your pulserate

In detail

It is because

At this time

As you sit in the dark

Before making your first move of the day

That you are the most fully alive

You will ever be

Second Slowdown

Hey all,
Pretty busy with work here till the end of the month. Expect poems intermittently and of varying quality and depth. So not much change, actually.