The man helped, carried, the
old terrier
down the two steps
and put him down
on the carpet
of the poetry and philosophy
department
where he fell over
and lay on his side,
the old terrier
I became hysterical
but the attendants,
concentrating on noticing
changes in demeanour,
did not remark this
and left me reading
in books of foreign poems
about everyday things
rendered mysterious
by being noted down
and he, the man, set
the old terrier up
right.
The clock I race retires its ticks sometimes,
till I can only trace its whirring hands;
or it hides its face from even me, and climbs
up to the sun to dial foreign lands
which pirouette in answer to its ring.
How can there be so much I just now see?
More belles to ring, their beaux who bring
them wan I Ching: Blind cats that sing
and roosters wring. Fat flounders fling
their flukes to cling onto the Ming
vase that goes ping. Large turkey wing
tied down with string. Loose words that zing.
Post-shaving sting. I’m in the swing.
Rewind the spring. God save the King.
Rewind the spring. Spring. Spring. Spring. Spring.
What are these jackdaws saying? I don’t know.
I need translations for the parts I hear.
The conversations of this smallest crow
come through my window loud and klaxon clear
but are more Greek than English to my ear.
These jackdaws lodge most seasons in the tower
of the giant church and grace the sunset hour
with flying squads whose aerial antics bring
them my applause, but now when blossoms flower
they nest as couples, celebrating Spring.
The mountain stream runs from the rocks
that are its bed, that were its bed;
rappelling boulders, taking shocks,
to join rivers, flow by docks
forgetting what it’s fled.
The pebbles that the torrent shakes
tumble but hang back
content with being troubled wakes
the stream invites but never makes
disciples of. They sink. It slakes
its thirst for speed, and whirls in pools
the bird bathe in, the birds bathed in,
reflecting feathers like wet jewels
tarnished by a world of rules
smeared and muddied out of ken.
Swans nest near the broadening banks
the stream acquired, the stream acquires.
The stream marvels at the nesting ranks
of creatures sheltering on its flanks,
and wanderlust expires.
The stream remembers as mirage
the waterfalls, the waterfalls,
that were its birthright: bright collage
it traded in for arbitrage
and pulsing puts and calls
upon its force, once pristine stream
that dropped away, that dropped away
and falling, traded ice for steam
fleeing its primeval dream
until it lost its way.
The rock the river rolls away
that covered graves, that covers graves,
exposes emptiness today
and brings the river peace that way
among the waves, among the waves.
The flying ant ascends the title page.
I gently show it where the flyleaf is
and watch, in what’s near rapture, it engage
the letters there. I watch its white wings fizz
across bold letters black as its fierce face.
I wonder as it wanders on a word
can words abstract a share of pride of place
in soft sonatas I have almost heard
and then, on waking, dream I only dreamed?
The flying ant seeks purchase on the spine.
I lift the book and watch this small ant gleam
in this, its night of future auld lang syne.
Like books, the ant exists, is here right now.
Like ants, I fly. We don’t know why or how.
If I knew all the colours’ names
I would not know enough
to catalogue the tulip’s flames
in these fields lined with rough
wet grasses where the great swans feed
and grebes give grebe chicks rides
through waterways that squarely lead
to dikes that damp the tides.
For miles and miles the tulips grow
in every shade then some:
lavender, and furnace glow;
purest black, and plum.
Reds so hard they hurt your eyes,
greens as pale as smiles
exchanged by lawyers, blues like skies
and golds that gleam like piles
of museum treasures in the sun
that recalls tulips when they’re done.
Cat purred, ‘the log of minus one.’ ‘That’s undefined!’
the jackdaw yelled. He flew down, cawing foul.
He darted off before the cat’s claws fined
his rudeness. See the cat rear up and yowl
that the bird is absurd to think she speaks of math.
‘If I add that the log of zero is a limb
of Satan, then you are on a slippery path
of soggy rhythms leading to a swim
in waters dark as the proverbial Styx,’
the cat adds. See the jackdaw, unimpressed.
‘Next,’ he tells the cat, ‘you’ll claim to fix
the log of positive one at what’s professed
to be itself one, into some dumb allusion
you will make to mask your massive math confusion.
‘Let me spell it out in words,’ the jackdaw said.
‘F of X and F inverse of x are inverse functions
If and only if F inverse of F of x equals x
and F of F inverse of x equals x.’
‘Thank you,’ I answered and tried again
to sprinkle grains of salt upon his tale.
