THE EYE OF A TESTICLE

Burt Reynolds smiles into the eye of a sheep,

this reminds him of his own testicles

that urgently need unloading.

He blinks and turns away from the sheep

then looks back at it.

A moment passes.

He jumps over a nearby fence into 

private land.

Knocks on a lime green door surrounded by rhododendrons

and enjoys the fuchsia petals and the light fragrance
that appears whilst he waits.

The door opens and an old man with no hair 

and a gluttonous stomach looks at him

"What can I do for you?"

"I need to borrow your wife"

"What for?"

'To relieve the stress knotted up in my aching balls"

"What the ffff fffuck, you ffff  fffucking fffuck"

The old man clenches his fist and his face turns the colour of Merlot wine.  

Burt takes a step back and turns to walk away.

The man chases him.

Burt runs and jumps over the fence
in one swift move.

There's a loud crash behind him.
The old man didn't make the jump.

Burt tries hiding behind a flock of sheep
and waits to go back inside the garden of the old man with the
gluttonous stomach.

He wants to pick a handful of rhododendrons

to give to his wife.

Heaven knows, she deserves them.

The Pampered Poodle

She lifts up her grey, pleated skirt
And shows her pink, frilly knickers to a
Little pampered poodle.
A small lipstick pops out from the underbelly
Of its curly, white coat.
The young woman giggles
In a way that would annoy most adults.
She then applies the red lipstick to her
Lips.

The Botanist's unfinished plan.

In a forest away from public scrutiny,
there hides the daughter of a revered Botanist
who in the later part of life created his ideal embodiment
of Mother Nature.

There in her follicles
four hundred thousand seeds of ivy lie.
Her hair grows and grows, and vines
through the forest as days go by.
Summer is easy and carefree but
in the winter there needs a prompt
so every morning she calls out-
''Sunlight! Sunlight! Bow down your might!''
To which the colour of chlorophyll spreads delight.

She tried life in society,
thought of growing up against a family home wall.
Camouflaging herself with the other Hedera hibernica.
Disappearing in that sort of half-life kind of way.
But seeing the people and how they lived
the lack of stillness, the lack of beauty,
the excess of noise, the cars, the pollution it all caused-
it's true that without indecisiveness, and to feed the Botanist's plight
she knew being among the wild felt right.

The new look of intellectual

no one speaks of my new face
i painted my nose blue
i added more hair to my eyebrows

i thought i would look more intellectual if
my brain could be seen by all
so i found a man (Dr Chan) who replaced my forehead
with a transparent window to my neocortex

he told me 'the look' is catching on in Paris and Tokyo.
they're speaking about my face there
soon everyone will want this

soon beauty will be all about the brain

[illustration by Paulo Rafael]

A Blakean Park

Little girl go to the park
hurry before it gets dark
feel the magic and mirth
fall between heaven and earth.

Tired man go to the park
hurry before it gets dark
forget work and do not moan
for soon she will be all grown.

Tilt

In her reflection
a vein on her neck looks obvious.
She’s never seen it before.
She holds her breath and jogs mildly on the spot.
Its thickness multiplies by two.
Then multiplies by two again.
It runs from her jaw to shoulder
and from this she realises-
her orgasm must look sinewy.

she rolls onto the ball of her foot. And sinks.

Gil Scott-Heron. April 1, 1949 – May 27, 2011

I heard about Heron's death today and I am truly sad. He was an exceptional poet, musician, and activist. I included him in the opening paragraph of my poetry assignment only two weeks ago. Here I speak about his influence:

''Leaving a democracy to live in a Communist country serves as an unlikely introduction to poetry, but that is how it began for me. I was teaching English in China and quickly became shocked at how aspects of the country operated; in a nutshell Mao was considered a God, global empire was pushed at the expense of its people and horrific injustices like Tiananmen Square were swept under the carpet. This is when my appreciation for poets like Allen Ginsberg and Gil Scott-Heron began to grow. Living in a country for eight months where popular networking sites like Youtube, Facebook and Twitter were banned along with many Google pages, Heron’s 1970s poem The Revolution Will Not Be Televised became relevant to me then, as it had been to others in the generation it was written. I began to appreciate how poetry can be used to dismantle personal prejudice and how it can initiate new ways of thinking [...].''



Few people contributed to performance poetry in the way that he did. The only light in this loss is that his lyrical talents will be more appreciated and enjoyed now more than ever. RIP.

The Importance of Pausing

my tongue is too small for my mouth
it has to stretch for dental consonants.
the roof of my mouth wishes it could kneel down
before my tongue and bridge the gap,
washing over this vertiginous feeling
that all this extra work is causing

i need to breath properly when i talk
separate each word with an invisible knot
make a sentence
and pause [known as tying the knot]
pause again if i’m emphasising a
point

             [pause for three seconds]
                   i'm scared to kiss
             [pause for three seconds]

sentences begin to run smoothly again
but as soon as i lose myself in excitement, frustration, importance;
when words matter the most, everyone goes,
''Pardon''
''What''
''Come again''

Bukowski

It was a good day
when I met Bukowski.

He held my hand.

Real tight.

Then he carried me over his shoulder
from the post office to his place.
His door was marked ''Hank's House''.
The walls were stained yellow.

He sat me down on his drawers and
untied my rabbit fur boots and
placed them on his windowsill.
He stroked them for a while,
as though they were one of his beloved cats.

Then he laid down on the floor next to his bed.
He told me to think of his chest as

a spring board.

''Imagine you’re trying to touch the ceiling and
jump''.

I thought this was strange so I asked why.
''Because I want to feel the weight of you on my
heart.'' he replied.

So I stepped on his chest

(his skin felt loose beneath my feet) and jumped.
As I did he caught my ankles
And my arms went thrashing through the air.

Dinner Date.

Berlin

Photographer: Gerrit Starczewski