obligation ii

today i made
a lovely little loaf.
am i a valid toiler?
instead of,
or as well as,
a poetry mine despoiler?
have my met my
productivity minimum
am i entitled to a break yet?
i posit that if workers suffer
ceo’s should go to jail
follow the money to personal wealth
pierce the corporate veil

is it the natural condition of humans to work? how are we to know when to stop? why are we doing the work we are doing, and not some other work? trade under capitalism, we are told by liberal theory is not a zero sum. its beneficial to all parties.

but is it? a huge amount of effort goes into busy work on behalf of the very rich. lawyers, accountants, luxury goods firms, builders making skyscrapers and mcmansions. but most of the world is poor. even in rich countries, there are homeless people who own nothing. should we not pause on space programs for trillionaires at least until everyone has somewhere comfortable to live?

obligation

as a child the buildings
and roads scared me
in their scale
the work of a million lifetimes,
where did they come from?
and what was my obligation?
all my life i’ve suffered
discrimination
just because i’m shy and lazy.
and inattentive
imperceptive, defensive
and stand offish
and prone to mischief.

i am terrible at job interviews. i am naturally averse to self-celebration, and not fast at thinking. a bit overly literal. dumbfounded by even the most predictable tell me about a time when. however, there is one question that i could answer endlessly — tell me your greatest weakness.

in my head

a rolled up blanket
for a headrest buttress
i report
every door i open
i say “this is where the magic happens”
in my head
and laugh
in my head

sometimes the poem is just what i was thinking that day. and where i was thinking it.

the yaktrax

a pointless punishment
for my eczemic fingers
janurian resolvers avoid
pavements rinkish
speak to the sun, the sky,
the sea and the trees
mass palomas fly,
sneeze around disease
rife and virulent,
bring us to our knees
re-shorn past the
pine scent xmas ceme-tery(eee)

my fingers were sore from the cold. the streets were asheet with ice. i bought myself some yaktrax, remembering them from a personal injury legal report. but the ice was gone before i got to wear them. meanwhile, people were throwing out their christmas trees, fed up of love and goodwill and all that sort of stuff.

reverse engineering

every poem, novel, recipe
and joke
exists quiet in the ether
the poet doesn’t create
she discovers;
with a notebook she uncovers.
a subterranean homesick miner,
reverse engineering the blueprints
of a universal designer

in a universe without life, does maths exist? does moral philosophy? do poems only exist after the are written? or are they just waiting to be found?

reus brexitus

brexitus rex, a fencepost;
no entry for french blokes
yes hello we are here
it is act two of don quixote
or quixote like quick’s oat
(though i prefer key oh tick,
like chaotic)
in which we ask,
will the windmills we recall
from the first act charge back?
in which we find,
that windmills
don’t charge on poets

happy new year.

i started publishing the poem a year after i started writing it. and as i published, i continued writing, but within a new context. in cervantes’ don quixote, book two was written after book two was published, and don quixote’s resulting fame was part of the story — the other characters he encountered has already read the first book. the first novel and the first example of metafiction. so if you are the sort of reader who throws the book at the wall when the author is introduced as a character, i’m sorry to inform you that this has been part of the challenge novels present to readers since the start.