their past was night
their future
a status quo
they had made
immortal
death rejoined
each of them
back with that dark
their light of day
dappled dazzle
like copper beech
blood was their shade
from the steel sun
Blackwells Oxford
24.2.2007
“Public Service”
my father decided
people’s lives
I in turn
decided
people’s lives
my friends all decide
people’s lives
my wife used to decide
other people’s lives
I decide our child
won’t go deciding
other people’s lives
Osney Oxford
23.2.2007
“S. Nicola in Carcere”
as Jacqueline
won’t be a-maying
this year
we went
Januarying
in Rome instead
taking with us
the bulb
in her womb
we went looking for
the roots of Spring
and found them
intermurally
beneath the temples
of Janus, Juno and Spes
down in Janus’
very January
whose doors
opened on war
and closed on peace
an emptyblue egg-shell churchincubatesJuno’s crypt
and the ossuary
of Hope itself
chapels
where people
divined their futures
instead of having scans
and archaeology
gets to be head-banging
knee and elbow-scraping
speleology
amongst niches
that once contained
safe deposit boxes
or low sudden pitfalls
onto Tarquin’s
veggie market
and its deflowered floor
something always
wants out
that tries to stay
hidden
even tiny
green and white tiles
that needed scrubbing
repeatedly
immured more
by the cornered dark
than by tufa
and brick arches
I felt certain
of your disclosure
baby to be born
in June
sure as we knew
we’d return back
into the sun
after an hour
in over two millennia
of man-made night
doors will open
on you this year
you will emerge
into the wet
and shaking light
our insurgent
from the pacified past
31.1.2007
Revised 26.10.2013
“S. Nicola in Carcere”
as Jacqueline
won’t be a-maying
this year
we went
Januarying
in Rome instead
taking along
with us the bulb
in her womb
we went looking for
the roots of Spring
and found them beneath
the Temples of
Janus Juno and Spes
inter-murally
down in Janus’
very January
whose doors
opened on war
and closed on peace
inside Juno’s crypt
and the ossuary
of Hope itself
chapels where people
imaged their futures
instead of having scans
an unbroken blue
egg-shell church squats
empty on their nest
sealing them in
on themselves
archaeology gets to be
head-banging knee
and elbow-scraping
speleology
amongst niches
that contained safe
deposit boxes
or low sudden
pitfalls onto
Tarquin’s veggie
market and its
deflowered floor
something always wants out
that tries to stay hidden
even tiny
green and white tiles
that need scrubbing
repeatedly
immured more by
the cornered dark
than by tufa
and brick arches
I felt certain
of your disclosure
baby to be
born in June
sure as we knew
we’d return back
into the sun
after an hour
in over two
millennia
of man-made night
doors will open
on you this year
you will emerge
into the wet
and shaking light
our insurgent
from the pacified past
31.1. 2007