Futility 
 


       The sheeted calm of evening now descends; 
       tip toe and mile high cool, and centred 
       on my once high heart with aching chill. 
       Sky washed with twittering the city world 
       now blank and round the hill 
       falls silent to receive the mind 
       and souls of once blind poets and the 
       thinning rill of words which might have been, 
       now lost; with word bound dreams of harpers, 
       bards, and troubadours, press on my inner mind 
       these words and images, and unspelled thoughts, 
       that I taste still. 
       Hear, where a car surges, throbbing through the 
       mindless dusk, how quiet folds behind it 
       following. A boy, face downward on his bed 
       a million miles away from chemistry, stabbed 
       through the heart with musing, where the shattered 
       stalactite of blocked mismusic stakes his heart. 
       Pumped poetry of hate's despair distant, 
       into the inner, reading mind impales him while 
       I hear alone, the liquid, resonating air: 
       short click of heels, a lass so purposeful 
       struts homeward on the evening run. 
       She leaves her meeting bus though I see not 

       for here leaves stir, a single leaf 
       shines with a tremble in sunleaving dusk, 
       the point of balance by a single uninspired 
       breathing falls to dust, and words unspoken 
       drop dark wings across the pointed towers 
       of city's crust. 

                               Across the road 
       news flickers, mimed and miniature and
       very bright; mouths stretched through 
       curtains in cathedral colours etched 
       upon this glowing dust. 

       Word of the poet's gathering, still forward 
       thrusts my mind; the ivory towers, mist-clad, 
       chance cloud, and need to thwart. 
       The street lamp flickers first, and stands; 
       this sentinel of watch and walking, 
       pale in dusk, lights only path 
       prefabricate; the AB journey 
       of an outer map where route is certain 
       and the fantasy is lost. False fairies 
       flickered once, enticed a lord, 
       into the marsh's dreaming, sucking, 
       shifting lust: but here we see the road 
       once, know it will not change 
       or idle with a kingdom's treasure lode; 
       nor does mud play and push, or roll a coronet, 
       or jaw bone, where lost battles flowed 
       upon this shrinking, shuddering earth 
       nor tracks a willow wisp. 

               Here, prodigal with penny vision, 
       lies an ancient Everyman beside a fern, 
       weed dying and unwanted there, dream soul'd. 
       This city gathers chill about her like a cloak, 
       her thinning blanket glamouring a deep crone's throat 
       beside a heatless, boneless flame; Mocks Morrigan, 
       ensourcells scavenging by nurture of her unfed need 
       with thought of pain, and victory, and bruising - 
       fitful fantasies of violence and of greed; 
       and endless unearned wealth, Strauss-waltzing 
       through the street. 

Who would here birth a poem? Should I turn 
aside, mouthing some muffled stillborn stifled line 
of wanton loveliness? Summon a flute to sing a grail? 
       Dispatch the ode, before the first line's read? 

       I might as well! 
                     How 
        if my dream should thin itself, 
        thread into the world 
        some longing for the beauty to be truth? 
                    How 
        if dream wraps deep arms of strength, 
         of royal victory - 
       asserts rich life within your own - 

                     then leaves? 
                               Only 
       wind stirring 
       in the ancient Chinese courtyard, 
      and the single 
       line of poetry to mark 
       some shiftless passing transient 
       light in dark 
        and people visionless may perish unremarked 
        now poetry is given away and dead: 

       nor old gods visit 
       with claw feathered dread, 
       to daub the wattle hut with wonder now that 

       visioning is given away 
                                and unremarked 
                                                and dead? 
 
 

                       rock then, 
                       roll then, 
               rumble stamp and mocking laughter. 
                       hate rules, 
                       love sucks, 
               in the dust another daughter 

               watch the singer stamp and shout 
               watch him. Follow after, 
                                       as he mouths 
               the microphone, hip sliding 
               sneer surrounding, shiva-bouncing 
               blind bleak head 
               and viciousness the look; 
               the swank of nastiness, for power 
               and manliness mistook, 
       the dead 
               is burying his death and all unknowing, 
               sobbing, rips away 
                        life's maidenhead. 
 

                               * 
      Let their dream stand. 
       I think they cannot hear, and my voice 
       fumbles at the blare, is over wrought 
       by chattering diners as the silver 
       flicks uncaught; and Chretien de Troyes 
       while singing, falters, ceased 
       upon the sweet line's call, and silent 
       bears away his tales of Arthur for dark 
       Mordred's hall  because his French king's 
       mad, and quarrelsome, and cannot heed 
       his dream: because a drooling queen 
       mouths at her dish, luscious in obscenity 
       of bliss, as if the banquet were 
       her bed; 

               sweet Joan hears voices, takes 
       her therapy and leads a normal life instead: 
       leaves in the forest do not fall, no soft 
       loam furbishes and all the Odyssey unstarted, 
       lingers in blind Homer's head 
       because 
                some brutish lord was bullying 
                       the fear bewildered 
       lad who slavered him, 

                and Milton's blindness, rode 
       and raddled by the commonwealth 
       of custom's busy deafness was enraged, 
       and saw no angel slant down to the earth 

                nor wanderer across the iron grey sea 
       sang for his slain lord hurt threnody 
                                because some bitterness 
       then boasted in the meadhall, drank 
                        with lesser things than loyalty 
 

       and Blake's Satanic mills in meekness 
       now obedient to the common will do lie, 
       the redbreast in his singing cage 
       is found already dead.  The punchline tagged 
       a million netted eyes have skipped and read. 

       I saw the best minds of your generation 
       were destroyed by madness, 
                                starving 
       because the best minds out of mine were silent 
       ravishing lost dreams they shackled to the lonely 
       semblance of a bed: wordless, and desperate and mute 
       and struggling - and all the while I see 
                aching and unwanted, and bemused- 

               deep breasted Gaia stands astride 
                       bleeding 
               for the sons of lost Thermopylae. 

 

(C) Copyright 1999
ALYS
All Rights Reserved

The Nexus Collection
ALYS

Blake's Law

COLUMBINE TRYPTICH
Ode
Queen of the May
Lullaby for the Dead
Communion
Dishonesty
Eye
The Fiddle

POEMS FOR FORT WORTH
Fort's Worth
For Cassandra
Soughing Song: Fort Worth

Futility
The Gate
Harvest
Pause
Punjab 60
Song
Stones
Ulster
Wanted: two in one


CONTENTS