so little is enough for me
on the loggia in the summer
through half-closed eyes...
the regular ping of a tennis ball
the scissor-like flights of swallows
the shunting of factory wagons
cheerful chatter from the café...
I hope it never ends
They called him Morgan Dempster Morgan
And he wore his name with pride
Though he didn’t have a heart
Just selenium cells inside
And he took all his food
From the wind from the sun
Gathered as he cruised
In his ever constant run
To and from the asteroid belt
The edge of near deep space
Helping mankind win
Their on going race
To repair their damage
To their home Planet Earth
Mining all the elements
No longer any dearth
Shunting them surely to
The growing colony base
Up there on the moon
In near home space.
The ice caps re forming
The ozone layer complete
And a growing healthier earth
Lay beneath mankind’s feet
Many lessons learned
Among those not the least
The planet was to share with every
Kind and species of bird and beast.
Gone all the ambitions of
The Colonising of space
Until they had learned properly
To care for their earth base
Morgan Dempter Morgan
Of the Android Space Fleet
Labouring with man to
Make the job complete.
Though he didn’t have a heart
Just selenium cells inside
They called him Morgan Dempster Morgan
And he wore his name with pride
We ran in the green field, playing with shadows in the summer breeze.
We watched the swallows skimming the grass and darting around the trees.
The flow of the river tickled our ears. The splash of water wet our face. The kingfisher didn’t appear but then a blue rush of feather disappeared without a trace!
We climbed high in the trees, we swung across the stream. We hid in the long scrub and heard the train shunting by the fields.
We heard a screech of the wild and saw the peregrine tear through the sky. We tried to follow its path but gave up after about a mile!
We trampled back through the fields. Mud and wet now carried by us. We watched the golden globe go down, aching for the sun o’ tomorrow to shine on us.
In the middle of a sky so blue
death came suddenly, sullenly.
Schräge Musik to my ears,
the sum of all fears in that
late October sky of brilliant blue
when I, one of the few, knew, too late,
the fate of a lapsed moment
in the foment of an aerial duel,
the smell of hot cannon shell
and aviation fuel assaulting the senses,
lowering my defences and sending me
spiralling seaward like a lame duck
who's wing has been clipped
by random shot, which this was not,
no, this was cold, calculated hunting,
shunting me down in an oil blown
maelstrom of wind, blood and fire,
flying by wire to a cataclysmic shattering,
leaving just a smattering of my mortal remains,
a few stains on that pristine strand,
where once, as a boy, I built castles of sand.
I could write you a blank cheque
To fatten the purse you adore
In the morning in a cash prayer you partake
A major part of your adopted folklore
Which despite tons of reticence, silence and patience I dislike
To the extent moribund manners like leprosy turn me off
Spewing and spawning a revulsion spree I can’t strike
In search of the lost love loaf
Your new lifestyle displaces
Shunting aside considerations of etiquette
Donning with unabashed glee your famous mini dresses
Clutching tight to a neon light the ticket
That flies you away, far away
To a destination I wish I didn’t know
Swaggering left and right to sway
Opinions I deem so low they throw
Icy water into my heart
Where empty spaces you distill
With gusto and undiminished zest as you depart
My heart burning ; its peace of mind you steal
To kill vestiges of the love
I once held so high
Far above
Wealth and health considerations as for you I now cry.
Stock
Lines derail trains made from stern stock
shunting worsted words in wagons to and fro
cabins depleted by looters piled on dock
signals distressed faces not any more
forefathers shape not their twisted progeny
when foremothers shunt them out of agony
the fear that might in the grain burst bunds
resides unformed in unwilling face
the dark inscrutable face of race
blood thinning through bastardized sons
forefathers shape not their twisted progeny
when foremothers shunt them out of agony
to guard the rhyme within the quatrain
no end of artifice will make for sacrifice
content lets form intertwine lines in vain
clickety-clack of the train lulls us nice
foremothers never think of their progeny
when forefathers shunt them out of agony
May 6, 1997
From the privately pub. coll. (rev. 2016): longhand notes (a binding of poems),1999, 115p.
© T. Wignesan – Paris, 2016
Once there was an intellect called smoke, the philosopher
Architect of a new republic of peace by dare
Shunting viruses by tolerance
Eliminating interferences by endurance
Bloody this domain is for gladiators
It so early it's only four o'clock and it's dark on a freezing cold and wet morning,
A man with a cap rings a bell to let us know times getting on and dawn’s dawning,
As the bell rings all the lights on at Billingsgate Market famous for it's fish,
Lighting all the fishy stalls and the dark walkways selling seafood's for a dish,
Haddocks and plaice packed in boxes with ice for many chip shops, frying tonight,
Fresh the same day for a restaurant for weight watchers who want something light,
A strong smell ozone wafts around the whole fish market from the prostrate cod,
Caught in big trawler nets by weathered fishermen on the sea with nets not a rod.
Sellers in this market shout aloud fishy slogans like, ‘Wink-wink-wink-winkles’,
Have em with some salt, pepper and vinegar that you can ‘Spri-spri-spri-sprinkle’,
Railway carts shunting, clashing, banging rolling along tangles of narrow streets,
From the Monument to the market their shouting is matched by the seagulls shriek.
A fleet of horse drawn carts take fish to nearby shops dropping off boxes outside,
Over cobblestone, waking all as they thunder along bouncing in uncomfortable rides.
Search for existence spreads thin
Our gasoline days numbered by the sun
While collection hounds scour zombie minds
Striving for fact and nimble opportunity
Institutions shunting brick and mortar
Each road running against walls of fate
Hunger comes back like a dagger
on face. With iris and fingerprints.
Live, fluttering butterflies, stuck
on lampshades. Wrecked, frozen, the ending
of seeming. Men in cages.
They were diluting the culture.
Chlorophyll siphoned off. No color,
no sprouts. The roads were dirty
with the ultimate truth, quarreling with the
water, insanity and vertebrae.
The creamy stuff, shouts and pants,
shunting the definitions. People come
and go from the paintings. There is no age bar.
Spring will be released from the impulses
of flesh in naked zones.
Ideas become pacemaker, for the ailing
heart of polity.
SATISH VERMA
Clickety-clack! sang the wheels on the track
slowing into a dead end shunting yard;
crawling aboard as the baggage gets stored
amidst groans from the red-faced station guard.
Scored by the nasal growl of the tannoy,
indecipherable instructions relayed to the blind;
framed by diesel fumes, tears gently dripping
into the void with clatter and whistle fading behind.
Echo and boom, career and carom
about the cortical fast track;
off steel and cement howls a chilling lament
for those leaving home to never come back.
Upon this evil stretch of line all is wrong and amiss,
the wrong type of leaves, the wrong type of snow,
wrong sense of direction, wrong love, wrong kiss,
wrong reasons to stay, no reason not to go.
Cursing this place, the look on her face
reduced life to perpetual travel;
alone in a carriage the dark side of marriage
made love's fragile tapestry slowly unravel
right to the end of the line...
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