Four Poems (Free, Painting Roundabouts, Smoke, Kamikaze Moth)
I wanted to post some of the poems I performed at a recent Comedius event. I hope you enjoy them!
The first poem, 'Free', is the result of a random word generator based experiment, and honestly I was delighted with how it turned out. 'Painting Roundabouts' is hopefully a self-explanatory middle finger to the so-called "patriots" who probably won't even know how to read a poem.
The third poem, 'Smoke' is written around a series of images, while the fourth poem 'Kamikaze Moth' is one I wrote ten years ago and recently rediscovered.
Free
As if to illustrate the point,
The spokesman emphatically
Gives clearance
To another car petrol bombed,
The eagle finally landed,
As if that had never elapsed before.
Peace storms in like a glacier,
Parking on the double yellow lines,
Perched on the ridge of the curb.
Lend me your ears
And I’ll twist your arm,
Safe in the knowledge that I can
Painting Roundabouts
St George’s cross
But not about
The things that actually matter
He’s punching down
With every swing.
Real enemies grow fatter.
He never had
His life handed
To him on silver platter,
So George is cross
About a bunch
Of shit that doesn’t matter.
He wants to shoot
The dinghy so
A child drowns in the channel.
A laughter laced
With malice
On the Question Time panel
Gets through to him.
Breathe mass opiates
From the flannel.
So raise the flags
As if they ever meant
A single thing.
St George’s Cross,
A crucifix
A noose from which to swing.
The union jacks
The prices up
And it’s Muhammad’s fault.
That choice being yours,
You marinade
That wound with vicious salt.
Smoke
There's a slow, indecisive suicide
Behind a cigarette;
A subtle nonchalant shrug
In the face
Of an apocalypse.
L.A. burns just like that cigarette
But there's no release
On this occasion
Unlike that slow, indecisive suicide,
This decision is made
For you, them.
A cig, a cig, ah,
Right where you wannabe
Spices up your life.
A smoking grandfather
Who spent a life
Telling you not to smoke,
Undone in a moment
With fiery coolness.
Even here, the skylines
Have more of a cigarette
About them.
Belching phalluses
That once meant something.
Then that slow indecisive cigarette
Scorched to the bitter end
Of that slur known otherwise in pastures green,
Is gone.
Light up again.
Kamikaze Moth
The flame in the bulb
With the killer filament
Burning and heaving
I could fly away
But the light is all I see
So I burn my wing
In the hope of change
All I see is all I want
So I go for it
Again and again
Moving away from failure
Towards it again
It’ll happen soon
I just keep telling myself
Don’t worry don’t
Panic it will all
Work out. Left with all the scars
My only wing scorched
But there’s a time when
We must all drown ourselves
Instead of burning what we have
Not physically, no,
But mentally we must go
To the deepest depths
Kamikaze moth
Dying just to make ends meet
In this bitterness.
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