Across from me there bent
two dull, cockerel men
dozing, blinking loudly
as they squawk at weathered hens

As the German galley moors
we find money on the floor
soft waves feather the rocks
we'll throw our sheaths upon the floor

Through caustic yellow fog
a field of raptured dogs
bark their confessions blithely
at the absence of a God

Still, I don't feel at home
despite the time alone
stomping beneath my feet
the tidied ash of lover's bones

So I'll try to force some truth
into the lies we use as proof
gold memories we'll claim
were simple follies of our youth

Minerva

The sky's lamp guidethe shepherds no more
the crow's bracken call
falls deaf on the satellites 
and the scrambled wire thicket.



New connections cleave
our lives in two.



Lost good mornings
to the grumble of ceaseless turning of gears
hear the boil
of all countries gargling
as we are dragged beneath a lidless sea
still marvelling.



And Oh! What Glory!
To have broken family
to have trampled wonder
to have farmed harmony
served it raw, skewered and cold.



We kick blossoms 
through the gutters of piss
where all honest captains
go down with their ships.

All Honest Captains

In lieu of tongues
that speak only dead flowers
who sing a scale of grey.



In lieu of hearts
that beat a punctual whimper
who shirk the touch of weight.



In lieu of eyes 
that soak as rocks in thunder
and as pebbles painted gold



In lieu of souls
that find no time to shiver
or seek no fire in the cold



Stitch us all
with threads of colour
to this mighty tapestry of old


that yells our story
alive with wonder
and strings our birth into our fall.

Tapestry

Sunken man

Drowning half a life

In the moat you've built 
That dull trench around your feet

Must have dug it in your sleep

We know no waking man 
Would have burrowed down so deep.


Sunken man

Scaring children on the bus

You scared me too

And I'm too big for that

Too determined, I will not notice you

As you stand swinging through the streets

Your cheek at your chin

Half a second from my face.


Sunken man

Lets talk about your face

Because I bet you never do

Despite it's shaping of you 
The oven baking you cold.

The child you carry

Whose picture you'll never show

At parties with your friends

– Were you invited.

If you had friends.


Sunken man
Were you born in procedural harmony
or forged with iron tongs
Beaten, steaming red hot 
to your parent's touch
Melting, not their hearts, but hopes
You're likely still red hot
though barely touched since.

Sunken man
I bet you soak by the gallon
Flaming whiskey tremors
Fill your shambling cotton hole
(An inch below most)
And most clots on your chin
as you shuffle diligently
into an armchair's handsome sleep.

Sunken man
We must love you most politely,
Most correctly, but
We'd queue to bury you by the drove.
For your reminder,
On the bay circle
of that ugliness we all hold
– sinew clinging to our bones

Sunken Man

Two men
if men, barely.
Eyes fired bright
yet somehow coal black too
dim
like gas rising from a square cave faux pas.
yes, in uniform
coat of arms to the teeth
pious hearts on pious sleeves
all on a humdrum pavement corner
one day since
we knelt flooded in concrete sleep.

And I am too eye blind
or too foot numb to ride their four-legged colt
mere, Christian nightmares
that kiss-listen and strum salvation 
upon my shirt.
That sing a choir into my shell
but hear no rhythmic clash
of life against belief
only a dew clear shore
whispering in the absence: 
that only God can now believe.

Mormons In Gabalfa

Written in New York, December 2012

Sycamore, now sea monster
Bloomed, now gone and bowed
Its outsourced, peripheral
heart on its slaves and lungs pumping
City out on a limb

This city that could not sleep
It ground is minced beef
Its porcelain gown cracked
shattered then glued
Its coast had a feast

I have no manners in Grand Central Station
I have no manners on Rockerfeller Centre
Just to see a little better
I have no manners at the top of the world

This city would not sleep
Its men are mumbling:
more money, more movement
more communal improvement
As a man walks backwards through a revolving door

And I've heard this all before
Seen these eyes
these swag bags, these sacks.
Their higher energy
yet lower voltage.

Still, as I feel my skin thickening 
and the blue line, northbound rocks
I read her book and I sway
Silently to the dance of time, run ragged
Waving between here and her
like so many flags

iamdanjones