Auckland Poetry

light flickery moments recording
books you found at the library
the behind the camera not famous
she was a better photograph
and nothing else mattered
except to the photographer
who was proud to have met the celebrity knew him
all that

while the mysterious
wandering eyeball
glass silver revealing girls
and background glad for
the attention in focus
some people
were rushing about recording
history for the parents that ignored them
but celebrated Bergman
all that

heartless creatures attending plays
seated in the stalls
where the theatre was experience
comfort an after thought
held by impressions of eager
fogotten mystics
calling at the sun
shine the ocres that spread
over the scenes
all that

stuff that pour into senses
wide open and accepting
the perception as fiction
moulding itself to the tune
talking about failures to see
interest on the hard won war
the far test of resolve
the winter of limbs
meeting swords
the harshest blades
wielded by screaming slaves
cutting their way out
of the belly of commercial
cost analysis the pathway out of noise
the wending river of wellness
the working weeks went east
and we dined upon the seats
around the table this feast

under the hill that was once a mountain
beneath the sea that fell from up there

the air felt hotly majestic
sticky to the touch
hard to remember the must
as it floated about like fingers
running through sand

moving at a rapid clip through the dunes
the wagon chewed away at the patterns
so randomly and beautifully laid by winds
nobody had predicted or marvelled at
they were winds from the ocean stored on calm
days for days like this great rolling wave
after wave lumped mounds of water in

Cold lucid eyes look up through the needles of
dancing light under the waves
fish juggling at each side of the mask
the diver with a broken cable must know
rescue is still there right until the end
passes

And that terrible tsunami event
on boxing day millions and millions of lives
damaged by one shrug underground

The titans sleep
and we play on the mound
think ye could
tred more carefully
now?

all in jewels it ticks
quietly like a crossword
the occasional clue
mutters somehow across the
room and soon you learn
to turn with the style
of a reverent loon

Is it the same,
when you go from the place
you call home

from place to place

never go
from here
your clothes fit like furniture

your eyes are on the sun
rising

Look what she made me
A fool in a car
She drives me to heaven
I fall under a star

Life isn’t mercy
or food on a stick
its harder than cherry stones
but you don’t get to pick

The future is the domain
of the cool
but living for the past
the mistakes of old rules
is somebody else
its someone else
not I
my furniture is not that colour

look what she made me
a fruity iced cake
she holds it still and inviting
on a shiny white plate

That the unexpected matters
give leave to grace
when what you do becomes
obvious again when what you
think is now no not a mystery
not to others now they understand
they can run from it too
when you touch impending danger
it informs you to pick up your sad
legs and carry them
even if it seems
all is lost
behind a prayer
walled inside the mind
in the halls of desolation
the extinction of grief

Land and Sea

The land belongs to the sea and the sea belongs to thee
The way I figure it is our ancestors came from the sea
Sure they were lizards, fat lazy old lizards but before they
walked about pushing trees over or fighting it out
smashing exoskeleton against exskeleton
- bits broke off and dust clouded our view - they emerged from the deep

The land belongs to the sea as it grew out of
it
borne out of itself
before the land
was water - water

water everywhere you looked

who is to say when land
first appeared and the first creature
staked a claim to it

sought to dominate by saying it
belonged to it

the land belongs to the sea
and the sea, it belongs to thee

Now is the King of the Land holed up in his fortress
immune to the odd attack?
As his defenses were extreme
the army in his pay laid everything to waste
they wanted to kill murder and rape
they were rewarded with titles and slaves
and claimed that land
but it already belonged to the place.

They would only be conquered
by the King of the Sea.

Thinking their towers of stone
were held together fast with hard mud
thinking the army held it together
by titular examples of valour (by thugs)
thinking their actions
would provide villages for children
to watch them poisoned by drugs
that army marched over the daisies
crushed them like ice
with hammers

so the old man staggers
and waves a stick at the passing cloud
it was once his land but now it’s ours
as the march of his money is counted
that army devours the flowers

it was enough
the waves swallowing him
he holds the stick over his head
unharmed certain of death in her tender arms

the land belongs to the sea
and the sea
it belongs to thee

The Dark Dream

The sun rose above our heads
giving me moments to absorb its ointment
and notice your gentle breath coaxing teasing
and tugging the wandering flock of clouds now
distant as the tremble under your eyelid
settles me
to a peace
unknown in my war-torn dream-life
away from
home

- Nicholas Alexander
- 19 June 1992

A walk through the park does it
When it rains and then shines
there are trees speaking a foreign language
and some that, like trees, stand up straight
if I were a bird and alighted on a tree
I would want to know all about it
Trees have no idea what to do except
hang on for dear life
the corruption of innocence happens commonly in clear daylight
there is nothing you can do when its a tree that has bent on its resolve
but a will of the wisp dragonfly is easy to brush aside
its far more likely to have taken the time to explore avenues of escape
it has darted this way and that
made a flute whistle under the willow
and sucked fig sap from the tree
nothing was out of range by extending its filament wings
new ground appeared but it never settled very long
so its ideas were grand and tended to be forgotten
like enthusiastic laughter
And in between, we have the union of the King and Queen
Henry and Winifred the reigning monarchs of the monkey
These bipedal beings that breed huge families - they
grow roots and settle in the forest
some just sit there and stare at the trees
during the rain the wind pushes great branches about
they wheeze like aching lungs whispering a chorus
and yet minutes later its calm again
the sun clear and sharp
The monkey had developed a new trick
it could consider the tree, drink and flick
a dragonfly onto its waiting tongue
the trick was to be both quick and still
Its luck improved with the
development of skill

14 October 2007
9:50am

Lost Pearl

When she went, she left behind her family of six
Her blanket and bed she lay on for seven years

Old Bentley slept on the well worn spot
and her books lay open in the bright sunlight

but her pearl brooch was nowhere to be seen
Something strong she could take over the end

a grasped for thing that stayed with her
like her accent or that way of looking at you