#2300 -- the struggle for crumb is work of a mouse

 

Andrew Hitchen's poster

2300

7.107

18.iv.26

the struggle for crumb is work of a mouse

 

the crocodile lies in wait

 

watch your feet    

or learn to fly

 

we polish the hubcaps here –

a casino!

luck is trying us

 

Alice met a chicken-sized gnat

the conversation went like this

 

nice to fail if only if

 

treetop, cloud and still

 

echo of shed dog

barking daylight

out of season

 

the downpour chill

 

moon for a sliver set east

 

you couldn’t have dreamt this up

 

kept on

guess a way

by hoof, by cloven paw

 

thought it might have been another day

was hot on the trail of some heavenly body

 

and so you find me

at a languish

 

if not one thing then

 

I have been that mouse

whisker and crumb

 

a tunnel through moons of cheese

#2299 -- spilling the dream

 

2299

7.106

17.iv.26

spilling the dream

 

all the day making

thing askew

 

in travels of a clock

fresh mown

we fuss for the long rhyme

 

time sleeps off the adventure

 

here’s petal just for strew

 

everything’s about itself

 

and join the dots

sign here

 

remember – once we were gods

made clouds to drape

 

I’m just a minnow too 

#2298 - watching the light come on

 

2298

7.105

16.iv.26

watching the light come on

 

and the sliver moon up east

 

lines come

broad brush to me

 

dreaming sun up

 

a first guess like the day

come into focus  

 

duck lift and dew clad

 

walk to the light

to be warm

 

shake pony legs out

a steady on

 

a smoke scarf fresh mown

whiff to it

 

here in a year’s other half

 

wouldn’t call it singing though 

#2297 -- everything by accident

 

 

2297

7.104

15.iv.26

everything by accident

 

no other better reason

 

the here and how

its why and when

 

they pile up

make a present

 

there’s how the daylight

comes and goes

 

by any chance

say luck, all said

 

and to advantage

one thing, another

 

the action of time is not a clock

 

I met you on the track

it was the where of feet before

 

there’s anger in underword

joy in the absence

light lust

 

how many mouths has this word been in?

how many ears wrenched aside?

 

fresh air

a loaf to rise

 

an accident in all events

 

turns from the truth to make one’s own

a very everyday occurrence

 

wordlessly at times

 

you know I mean it too

#2296 -- I went looking for tomorrow’s poem

 

2296

7.103

14.iv.26

I went looking for tomorrow’s poem

 

made a little cap of my hand

that was to scan the horizon

 

had a good gaze

 

I set out as if day were a page

and so it is

 

I searched in the fallow

knew I had the words

or it was under them all along

 

or I had been

now the poem was gone

 

had my hunting hat, my whistle

took along a grim thesaurus

I gambled with the light

 

one must conjure one’s own, you know

 

yet what’s to come must lie out of prediction

as if a thought askew

an object in the wilds of will

a picture musing too

 

you’d think somewhere in my head ahead

the poem come unstuck

leash loosed at least

or tether ending

 

I’d tempt it in with, say, sugar

or sly – a sidle up, rub here

and wisely

 

one sneaks up behind

tap or a tickle

will words turn?

one never knows what will find

 

but that the poem’s wishful –

the desperate hope

in a drastic season

 

must have been under the great stone of time

 

I call it my own forever after

call it all sorts of things

 

I hang it on the wall and sing

although it’s not yet there

#2295 -- no magic, still tricks

 

2295

7.102

13.iv.26

no magic, still tricks

for wise surprise

for Beth Spencer

 

cut the clutter

 

delete the non-lexical for a headline

 

yet nothing is wasted

however devoutly

 

Mari Kondo is a very bad person

her book’s in the trash

or cut it up for a collage

 

re-jig, resume

 

I think of Beethoven and I think of Mozart

we’ll come back

 

all this requires expansion

 

each line must live

 

and yet their blood is upon it

(the darlings, I mean… I blame them)

 

how many dots may we ask to join?

ask and be asked

 

congealed blood is black pudding

 

we set out in the sea of the already

things done, I mean

 

spread a rumour so

 

back off head

butt out heart

 

it’s the not-yet, isn’t it

 teaches us doubt everything?

 

if it looks like a poem

and smells like a poem

if I stand it on its head

tip toe too

whisper it

 

release the poem from the stone

 

step back – it breathes

and we with

 

hollow out the hallowing

 

what does it want?

thing of darkness, thing of light

and all for a song

 

that’s ambiguous

 

I’ll have an icononclasm

 

weight of it’s in what won’t be said

 

they call it reading between

where else?

 

some say to keep it in your pants

 

I’ll stick with the never-yet-before

 

the live jolt

and the space around

 

the pruning and the range, the ramble

 

the page as day as page

 

revolves around the poem

making us all so shine

 

the poem’s a happening thing

#2294 -- every creature has a clock inside

 

2294

7.101

12.iv.26

every creature has a clock inside

 

wears wilderness

 

ear close, you can hear

 

every breath is all of time

              they’ll flee

 

where does intention enter?

whose will my appetite?

 

every motion – paw and wheel

persistence!

 

a scratch and they’ll say ‘nothing’

 

so all the Earth’s inscribed

 

a sun’s from flower bright

 

a pond from cloud

from puddle to slash

 

someone escapes from the egg

(crude of me for saying)

 

all without a thought or else

 

you could call it from a dream

think back

how otherly all are

 

it’s in the underfur overarch

 

this happens in the middle of nowhere

 

just cross my path

you’ll know