2 New Poems

Sketches

Your visage watercolours float

to a cinder-bright surface, speckled

trout-like by temperamental rain,

ringed in hallowed marquee of jazz spirit

dancers, the bright caress of shoe taps on

scuffed linoleum.

Renaissance oils streak down coloured

canvas maps, cave wall in simplicity;

the best I can manage on such short

notice, the brief wonders I can hope

of capturing as pointing patterns, as

cutting clicks.

The Whole Thing

Passing out pieces, broken chocolate and
polluted paintchips; it was something for
winter’s half-cloaked mirage of solitude,
something to sustain a broken lip fixture
when the water couldn’t lift to drink,
when the wine was rotten, sickly-sweet.

You gave, gambler’s hands and shaking card
decks one by one turned about to face
florescent skylight, all gold passed from
hand to filled tooth,

and I was clumsy by turns, too much bet
on merely the parts you deigned to show.