“All concrete phenomena cannot manifest themselves of their own accord. They are mere perceptible appearances intended to represent their esoteric affinities with the primordial ideas” Manifeste de Symbolisme, Moréas
There is company in strangers, the passers-by of
cities in self-embrace, out of place and straitened,
stiff, welcoming the solitary confined, who ponder heavily
the swatch of narrow strips of sky. These litmus hours,
the chemist chalks, deep in his dust, a question, and
sits askew, a tumble of bellows and belches. He towers
In twisting oases – the glittered streets, the cold hand
shouldered, barking in clack-black alleys finally croaking
a fond goodbye, a sailing by, lined up on the wall the high-
heeled guide, in for a dip or a drive, in for a ride
the snarling lips buck his gigolo cap sideways, he
hastens, smear-cheeked and ravelled, to loosen his tie
Every morning this alley sings country songs, a chorus
of wall flowers and French obscenities, feeling in between,
the chemist shrugs, and orders one more as his lips overdrive
and skate into a seemly smile. But there were scratches
in the sky. People’s faces to him seemed battered, mis-shapen,
hardly right. The chemist blew on the window, struck matches
in the night air, wrapped his neck in silk (the day had
wandered away, unseen). The first breath of summer,
he despaired in the humming street belly, a thousand cries
split the air, damaged faces recoiled from his lingering stare.
In flashing nights, the protecting trees murmured
“I’ll be there, I’ll be there.” he cut a sickle edge in the air,
When you have broken through your years, mad-capped
senility sternly stares from portcullis shadows. Twine light the
chemist set forth, compassed now between the running stars,
on through the city’s varicose suburbs