Poetry I

Here are three free verse poems I have written which reflect distinct moods I have felt. They have been written during the relevant times of emotion such that I like to think they, as deliverers of feeling, represent reasonably accurate crystallisations of myself at different points in time. Unfortunately, they are rather self-indulgent and esoteric, written primarily for intellectual and cathartic pursuits. Nevertheless, I would like to include them here as starting points for my poetry writing.

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This first poem is called Carnival. From a literal perspective, it is an isolated examination of modern partying from the perspective of a marginalised and lone observer. However, the purpose of the poem is an exercise in hypocrisy and ignorance, for the speaker is inevitably a part of who he describes as 'they' and 'them'. His distaste is futile and his observations bring no progression. Through this, the poem also explores powerlessness and the facade of agency we now experience in a disconnected age, regardless of whether we are active or passive. It experiments with visceral description, line and syntax construction and overall form.

Carnival

Look there, the lasers and lights and bouts of

Definite toons; the enthused string of expectation

Tightened with a pinch of insobriety. The

Laughter and the embers and deafening songs all-right

Under the swept-tinted viscous sky; Night

Drags on smouldering against the watchful eye

Of no one but I: observing this fair

With some confusion.

Speakers pick up

The pulse of the herd. Desperate tunes and the

Lights parboiled. Swaying

With the thumps and flashes that ebb.

Frothy and spilling the substance sap of their

Thoughts lap in accordance with the chemicals bonds

Of relief. Released from reality, rowing

Further and further into the black bubbles of

Oceanus. Morning they stop, reborn tomorrow

Or perhaps the day after - pain walks slow just as how

Quickly these goers degenerate.

Courageless bottles, pumped necks throttled

where they have leaked redness, stomach

Acid simmering in the heat of bodies. And the

Stumpy leeches, sucking on the thick tick-tock dregs

Which have once again found a clot of their

Choosing. Walls which curve, peaked sweat

Shimmering in pink strobes. Dripped lips turning

Rabid. Vapours of sober breath wisp

And there falls the drool that mothers once wiped away

In necessity of action.

But it is only me amidst the fiends

Who sees this sickening state. Growth of

Infancy; regression with the varied lights and music and grand

Polemics about the importance of stress relief.

Their speech is the speakers – unopposed, unfettered

But with each twist of tongue I see the plastic mildew rot against their

Skin. Limbs flail in the fun fair and

I disgustedly discuss: who are they to verify us?

Their breath seeps onto the floor and when it is cooled it

Wraps around their hardened heels. Fire suppurates in them to replace

Them. Fire sloshes through arteries to replace them. Fire fuels

To replace, then all unseeing the march repeats.

Late car-rides and

Time markers and ten seconds to count for ten decades of their

Devolution; a plague of physicality and sentimentality

Yet they grin therein, their chins displaced. Their bones touch air

And the softest of winds could incapacitate them. How they will wish

They could have redone it, not relived it. But not now,

Only in a millennium after the youthful sun dies, where their forms can no

Longer escape to the dark-bright sanctity of their actions, should they

Surprisedly realise their laser light paradise is a land of lies.

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The second poem is called One, or I. It combines senseless ambition, indiscriminate condescension and self-aggrandized riddle-like references to paint a picture of egotism. Just as an egoist cannot believe that others comprehend his objectives, the poem is so inwardly focused that it is inaccessible in full. Its style reflects E. E. Cummings with the use of typography, broken syntax and a non-standard use of lexis and punctuation.

One, or I

Theres a special place for them

It’s here

       tick        tick

Get back you.

Theres a special place for everyone

not him

He’s an era

Rothschild

Alexander

of Macedon

he has no special place

contest gives place.

Pass twelve and meet him or

take some more - you won’t have him.

See his revul u sion

As he watches

The seconds         as         they         tick         by.

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The third poem is called Evening Pincer Movement. It is about wanting something you are not allowed to have and imagining how things would be if you could live a different life. The futile conclusion of the poem is that if we considered our lives panning out differently, we would realise that in that other life we would also consider our lives panning differently, and so on. This circular and constantly unfulfilled desire is framed by an extended military metaphor with the use of standard quatrains, internal rhyme and narrative progression.

Evening Pincer Movement

From a different field stood he as me

Yet we knew dusk would be our signal

To find to take to keep to want;

Our elusive objective now-protected.

Operation Nightingale (mine, unauthorised):

Cross the marron bentgrass, reach the mapped rouge

A dainty chateau; its burning grace,

Holy light, white under twilight.

With a hand I'd reach for it is my freedom,

With myself I'd advance but it is high treason,

Yet he across me is held by no reason

Like I am. And dusk is coming.

Such a short distance away; tender aurae,

Cleansing flames simpering in the evening,

Delicate tunes of hearths

That don’t exist out here.

Pristine walls, pale and freshly painted,

Narrow doorways and winding labyrinths,

Incense and quiet and in a sense; innocence,

The carefree spirit of a playful phonograph.

To occupy this heaven in enemy lines

I cannot. I have a home, not this one

Though this man across the field, it may be his

Just as tonight I know it’s not mine.

What is it worth the allegiance of one

When it takes away the truth of two?

He and me, across each other,

He, free, me, stuck.

Positioned at wrought iron, I stare through bars,

A wistful mind lacquering the metal;

What if I was you? What if I could move

And escape the mud for a second.

But what use is a second, permanence I keep away from here

Perhaps in his chateau he will look back at me

Through the dark-wood windows, knowing I have what he does not

And I, knowing he has what I do not.

It is the greatest dilemma I come to,

To wish to be oneself elsewhere...

To advance and in doing so retreat,

Knowing oneself elsewhere wishes to be me.