During November 2011 (1. Burning a Poem)

Burning a poem

in love with you

forsooth as

letters fragment a page

to breathe an eye

for an eye

a tooth for a tooth



Sans doute! Yo soy

letters in flight

the flame of tongues

the crackle of spit

the lunge of meaning

perceived by

a sheath of being



This flesh of doing

by shards of letter fall

a glassy perusal

the body in motion;

the enigma of a

sideways glance

one is reminded of an Eastern

dance



for the vines throughout your corps



Tongue by tongue

our lives are handed down

During November 2011 (2. Our Mother Tongue)

Thought by thought

words are welded here

our mother tongue,

turn begin again





Rushing water chances its thumbs

petering gridlock

the motorway is still

folding onto running wind

a copse by chance

a glassy siren

pulsing yellow, brick red



notes

badgering arabesque trees

give way to painterly verde

a scrimmage of

prehensile brushes

make a prose of entwining sky,

an intelligent blur

for your photograph.



Women for moments elapsed

in cars chasing tails

as if

predicting the Cutty Sark,

walking through pitch green

passing food

through fingers by hand



Standing by the night of trees

porous nigh to the welt of sky

a young woman as amassed

as lean

in flickering light her body carved

her face

etched by anger

mute yet visceral.

During November 2011 (3. The Intrusive Poet)

And this! And this!

is reason or something

dissimilar, erudite

or an empty vessel

worthy or meaningless



The truth, a truth

or not a truth at all

or something as strange as

Galilean, as everything

nothing

or something that may not



resemble anything

at all





The Dromedary has one hump and

the Bactrian two and this should

be as clear as it is true!

During November 2011 (4. A Dance for Horus)

Spliced by several cataclysms

Persephone is diced

and a Falcon

became our sexual freedom,

a longing for truth

that otherwise

should not be written



for an Owl is greater

than an Eagle

and an Eagle Owl is neither.

Roll the dice

your hand is gratuitous,

the ecstasy of the female

form



chessing as the leaves of

a book a Jazz hand

flamboyant at the carvery

a Pigs head, a la morte

de la morte, rings the

pain of parting



And dessert is an open wound

Sisyphean, Dionysian

beyond the scope of words

we should paint or photograph

this Shakespearian moment

as feeding our culture,

as being its downfall.



Ballerinas dancing, balancing

the table on our laps

a twist of fate

as a die is thrown,

a finger points a la asymmetrical

vaginas pivoted West,

pirouettes through pork

and sherry trifles



Apples fall to the floor

and bread is soaked in wine

and whiskey.

The dancers' beauty by some

implicit chemistry alludes,

allegorically to a guest

masturbating then spurting

onto bread

fickle sliced

by scissored hands.



By luck, as near intrinsic

as truth

to the duck and mushrooms

vinaigrette, salsa and

oranges soaked in white rum,

for the steel of an

Achilles tendon

feathers Apollonian



A stage, a theatrical performance

via CCTV

slipped into shadows by

covert snappers

for Flickr and Youtube

Facebook or Twitter,

Art is consumed like a

Jackal at a lamb



and art's traces are sold for

greater monies

than to put this poor project

beyond the realms of imagination

borrowed, begged or stolen

bruised or finished by the

ups and downs

of inflation.





We must only see with adequate

eyes

and enquire with open minds

to witness the truth

we cannot escape

that we are the prisoners

of our own devices.

A Consequence of Post Modernity

Misanthropy is the most essential and ubiquitous form of prejudice today.  Rather than sexism, racism, discrimination due to illness/disability or class, human beings intolerence of humanness (the state of being human) and other human beings is more sinister and encompassing. 

The new "Internet art" (or poetry) may well lie beyond the Internet. I.e. a return to real-life! If this is so, which it probably is, then art/literary theory will have to go back up its arse and return to cancel its self out and begin again! Never mind!

Poetry/Art rebelled against postmodern, real-life by utilising the Internet, which was freeing, but now seems passe, dull, consumed by Capitalism, legislation, censorship, mediocrity and ironic, narcissistic navel-gazing. Perhaps, even worse than this, is the desperation for "fame", whatever that is? A kind of ironic, non-famous kudos, that fails to dull the line between those who really are famous and those who are not.

Therefore, the Internet (in its burgeoning early days we had hopes of a new 60's, intellectual, creative and democratic) has become a reflection of the societies that it criticised and became a much needed escape from. Put in more cogent terms, the Internet has become stale. A flag for Western, High Capitalism, Orwellian, Big-Brotheresque paranoia, stultifying legislation/censorship and a Media driven, sex-fuelled mythology that speaks to our genitals, before legislation "castrates" us of our normal, healthy needs!

I suppose that the Internet, now subsumed by societies, is beginning to take its place as another rather useless, but somehow essential modern-day, technological or mechanical device. Just like the TV sits in your living room and spouts a thousand channels of crap (and the odd, good program), or your car cocoons you like a neurotic cyborg and speeds you into gridlock, these inventions hang about as if we couldn't live without them. Somehow the notion of a spurious "advantage" of the above and other inventions persists in our postmodern, artificial lives. Sure, there were advantages of the car, but today you're quicker on a bike. Unless your going very far and can guarantee some clear roads, you may as well pedal or walk.

What are the new poetics? How will art respond to the stagnancy of the Internet? By returning to the real? Probably, at least for a while...  After all our transition is from distinct societies to global economies and cultures.  We can see this unfolding before our eyes as leaders from around the world struggle to cope with a global recession.  Maybe reality is becoming sweeter than the virtual?  It is by addressing real problems that artistic individuals can reflect on the major difficulties that we are currently experiencing.   This is surely a more fertile ground for creativity than the stultifying Internet, that has always been compromised by excessive information and questionable quality?