Poems.

Thirteen
You will be four minutes from home

when you are cornered by an officer

who will tell you of a robbery, forty

minutes ago in the area. You fit

the description of a man? – You’ll laugh.

Thirteen, you’ll tell him: you’re thirteen.

You’ll be patted on the shoulder, then, by another fed

whose face takes you back to Gloucester Primary School,

a Wednesday assembly about being little stars.

This same officer had an horizon in the east

of his smile when he told your class that

you were all supernovas,

the biggest and brightest stars.

You will show the warmth of your teeth

praying he remembers the heat of your supernova;

he will see you powerless – plump.

You will watch the two men cast lots for your organs.

Don’t you remember me? you will ask.

You gave a talk at my primary school.

While fear condenses on your lips,

you will remember that Wednesday, after the assembly,

your teacher speaking more about supernovas:

how they are, in fact, dying stars
on the verge of becoming black holes.

Lament
For the green turtle with her pulsing burden,

in search of the breeding ground.

For her eggs laid in their nest of sickness.

For the cormorant in his funeral silk,

the veil of iridescence on the sand,

the shadow on the sea.

For the ocean’s lap with its mortal stain.

For Ahmed at the closed border.

For the soldier with his uniform of fire.

For the gunsmith and the armourer,

the boy fusilier who joined for the company,

the farmer’s sons, in it for the music.

For the hook-beaked turtles,

the dugong and the dolphin,

the whale struck dumb by the missile’s thunder.

For the tern, the gull and the restless wader,

the long migrations and the slow dying,

the veiled sun and the stink of anger.

For the burnt earth and the sun put out,

the scalded ocean and the blazing well.
For vengeance, and the ashes of language.

Vergissmeinnicht
Three weeks gone and the combatants gone

returning over the nightmare ground

we found the place again, and found

the soldier sprawling in the sun.

The frowning barrel of his gun

overshadowing. As we came on

that day, he hit my tank with one

like the entry of a demon.

Look. Here in the gunpit spoil

the dishonoured picture of his girl

who has put: Steffi. Vergissmeinnicht.

in a copybook gothic script.

We see him almost with content,

abased, and seeming to have paid

and mocked at by his own equipment

that’s hard and good when he’s decayed.

But she would weep to see today

how on his skin the swart flies move;

the dust upon the paper eye

and the burst stomach like a cave.

For here the lover and killer are mingled

who had one body and one heart.

And death who had the soldier singled

has done the lover mortal hurt.

Destruction of Sennacherib
The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,

When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,

That host with their banners at sunset were seen:

Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,

That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.

For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,

And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;

And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,

And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,

But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride;

And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,

And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.

And there lay the rider distorted and pale,

With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail:

And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,

The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.
And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,

And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,

Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

Envy
This rose-tree is not made to bear

The violet blue, nor lily fair,

Nor the sweet mignionet:

And if this tree were discontent,

Or wished to change its natural bent,

It all in vain would fret.

And should it fret, you would suppose

It ne’er had seen its own red rose,

Nor after gentle shower

Had ever smelled its rose’s scent,

Or it could ne’er be discontent

With its own pretty flower.

Like such a blind and senseless tree

As I’ve imagined this to be,

All envious persons are:

With care and culture all may find

Some pretty flower in their own mind,

Some talent that is rare.

Honour killing
At last I'm taking off this coat
 this black coat of a country

that I swore for years was mine,

that I wore more out of habit

than design.

Born wearing it,

I believed I had no choice.

I'm taking off this veil,

this black veil of a faith

that made me faithless

to myself,

gave my god a devil's face,

and muffled my own voice.

I'm taking off these silks,

these lacy things

that feed dictator dreams,

the mangalsutra and the rings

rattling in a tin cup of needs

that beggared me.

I'm taking off this skin,

and then the face, the flesh,

the womb.

Let's see

what I am in here

when I squeeze past

the easy cage of bone.
Let's see

what I am out here,

making, crafting,

plotting

at my new geography.