Poem 1

RAW

For Nick Cave, Joe Strummer, Ian Curtis, Jim Reid and all those others

In this bleak charm of youth –

Those lightning bolts.

Some strange bird will sing.

The antidote to the:

Natural order – of – things.

In the world view a Chernobyl grows.

And grows blistering and pricking

In soothing mid-winter- wind – chill – factor

There is the curse that will ensnare

To trip and strangulate

The idealist dream;

The seed is planted,

In the night’s long desert….

Smoke climbs toward to window

Pen dancing in every direction.

Then!  The voice creeps out

Rising about the flight of birds

Growing in the basest sweat

Of they whose chords who’ve been struck

As they ‘dance dance

dance dance dance to the radio.’

And on, a sea over lapping

Waves and currents

Raising some to immeasurable heights

And others drown in the day’s long gutter.

Strummer in his arrogant stance

Echoing put ‘I fought the law’

On and up to the centre of city

And then the revelation:

“JUST….”

      ‘Let Love In’*

The centre of the city

Being walking through

The sweat after the gig

“Remember, you were alive”

Those raw voices reached

Out drew us in

That smell of sweat….

And passed on

Tattooing the memory

Tattooing the soul.

*The album by Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds

Poem 2

Lost alone at night

I found myself in the accident of dressing

That cats and dogs never quite got.

I found myself taking the train

From the diaconal Paddington Station

Finding hollow space – invisible pressure

On my head – all ideas extricated

Face up: face out against the window –

That chill air, that glass holds so well.

Poem 3

Night in the park among the sculptures

After the wine and coffee

And talk…night drop curtained with cold air.

We back wondered along through the freezing night air

Although this apparently still scene

Suddenly became alive.

They came alive beneath the moonlight

We passing along: watching.

their eyes adhered to us

Their defiance in abstraction

The nomological ignored –

I wanted to talk to them

They wanted to play some game

Hide and seek perhaps.

In their nocturnal life

Some worlds never collide

As they must not

Pamplona Gut

The running of the bulls

down gullets dusted with olive oil,

Hemingway chews hungrily

on the tail of the slain creature.

Plenty of garlic, a dash of Navarra grape,

the colour of Picasso’s dreams.

Merry-go-round

The birds circle on

a Ferris wheel in a

polysyllabic sky

In miniature, they

look like great eagles forming

knitting pattern pearls

Light patches of white

sky, seeing is believing,

enthral the storm clouds

Turner seas in swells,

God is moving furniture,

all is lost it seems

The Sun is a ghost

making shadow puppets

out of burnt arrows

Peritoneal

I have sewn a safety loop into my

flesh to be used for fastening hinges

inside my blood cells. The tubes, feather dry,

sugar my rose-hip tea, the milk syringe

howls into the clunking machine midnight.

Might I go outside in the bone orchard?

Young jowl roots coloured yellow, the old white

imagination, slugs on the morbid

nettles. A killer on the honeysuckle

noxious in the healing of the limbs, an

abattoir staring up at a petal

rasping a last breath before I guzzle

divorce, swallow divergence and red wine.

Severance, sable dust is my bloodline.

“Contemporary Poetry”

It’s a digital
playground
of unworthy
abstract
artists

Desperate
smiles and
poetry that
owns no merit

Who can write
in volume
the most
forgettable
amount of
poems

It’s a race
to be first
and nobody
is watching

The audience is
the competition
Both are stuck
on the same stanza

Write your boring
little heart out
Write like you
actually have
something to say

If your writing
meets the standards
of contemporary
poetry

You’ll be awarded
a friend request
on Facebook
by some other
guy with an
equally small penis
waiting to praise
your boring poetry
in the hopes that
you’ll do the same

© Michael Marrotti

“A Critical Self Analysis”

If I were a little
more dishonest
Smiling when I
didn’t mean it
Offering praise
instead of candor
I’d have more friends

If my penis had
a few more inches
Got off sooner
than later and
lowered it standards
I’d have more lovers

If my dealer would
lower his prices
Picked up the phone
when I wanted
and didn’t behave
like a green eyed
bastard
I’d be less unstable

If these words
weren’t so fluent
Profound and
proactive
Worthwhile and
clever
By the standards
of the small press
My book of poems
would’ve been
published

© Michael Marrotti

“The Banality Of Poetry”

If each platitude
was met with a fist
This world
of monotony
would be
bestowed
the gift of
originality

If there were
laws against
banality
You’d be
guilty as
charged

If there were
fines and restitution
for each cliche
thing you do or say
Socialism would
flourish and the
trivialities of life
would cease to be

Redundancy
would vanish
and then maybe
just maybe
I’d take the time
out of my schedule
to sit down with you
and hear what it is
you have to say

© Michael Marrotti

Dead Dog

Tonight
I ripped open the Ziploc bag
encasing the cremated remains
of my dead dog.

She was the family puppy
at first, of course, but
as my siblings and parents aged,
she became my girl.

Under the mist
of gray clouds,
I spread the last remnants
of once was my
first love.

A black canine
without prejudice,
judgment or malice,
just a adorable Labrador 
mutt born to be free,
running wild
no matter what
shit she returned
with stuck to her fur.

In her gray years,
she developed a pinched
nerve in her spinal chord,
squeezing her with nightly seizures
that voided her bowels
all over me, as I was
always the only one
to hear her yelps for help.

I’d watch her silhouette
stumble around the back yard
against the burnt black night
as she struggled to recover,
leading her back with
optimistic white lies.

A few weeks later,
my parents put her down
that everything would 
be all right.

All I have left
is a blurry photo
hours before her
lethal injection,
and a yard that is
no longer mine,
but is scattered
with her bone fragments
and ashes embedded
across her final resting place.


Scribbled by Chris Butler

The Boy With No Manners Broke Your Heart, Really?

So you like bad boys,
do you?
Then why are you crying
and upset
because he’s doing
what bad boys do?
Oh, you don’t want him
to be a bad boy to you
just to everyone else,
a selective bad boy thingy?
You’re pissed
because he keeps going out
with his bad boy friends
(You’re actually saying this?)
Ok, he can go out
with his bad boy friends
but not when you say so?
So you want control?
you want to police him?
You want to be his prison warden?
You’ll be picking out
his clothes for him next,
telling him what to wear each day.
Cutting up his meat in restaurants
and spitting on Kleenex
to wipe his dirty face in public.
That bad boy of yours
needs to get himself safely
away from the likes of you.

© Paul Tristram 2016

She Has A Face Just Like That Donovan

You know, that folk singer
from the 60’s?
I keep waiting for her
to start singing
‘Season Of The Witch’
or something stupid like that.
Apparently she really likes me?
I mean, she’s lovely to talk to,
has a great sense of humour,
knows her single malts
and her interests go way beyond
kittens, cosy nights in
and long, romantic beach walks.
But I can’t fuck that,
it’s just too disconcerting.
I guess I’m just not
‘Mellow Yellow’ enough
to get that image
out of me bonce, mate, innit.

© Paul Tristram 2016

Word’s Of Wisdom

These words
I speak
are charitable
It’s on the house
have a poem on me

These words
I speak
live in the
moment
Time is
precariously
ticking right
on bye

These words
behave
like a slut
off the rag
You can
have it first
I’ll take
sloppy seconds

These words are
like humanity
When you need
them the most
They’ll get up
and leave you

The soul alone on the Island

The Stone shack – alone austere

Birth simply happens

An almost non-event

As too is death

Equilibrium is as it does

Moss silently listens

Men’s blood is black

The children – know

The air breathed is rock

Cementing each – and – every – action.

Nothing is valueless

Everything is indivisible

Walking along this horizon

To a backward infinity

A thousand slated rectangles

Mirroring the light –

Days are as ripe as seams

Ever-expanding –

The girls dream of strawberries

And Keats wanting Lawrence

Boys dream of Zanzibar

Fulfilling their fathers boots

Whisky whistles a merry tune

From dusk into timeless night

Dark tales shared across raucous  

Laughter, horror, fear, wit, and wantonness

Then tomorrows Tells

Remind the men like a wife reminding

These aurora borealis 

Mystical majesty

As they in their youths blood

Know their destiny but may not understand

SCAM CALL POEM

“Hello” I answer.
“Are you the owner of a PC on this number
sir” a voice asks
“Yes” I say
“Sir, you have very serious problems with
your PC; it has been sending us data
informing that your device in under
serious threat and I can help you”
“And who are you?”
I ask
“Sir, my name is Pedro, I am calling from
PC Experts and I need
you to give me remote access to your
PC so I can save your PC Sir”
“Yeah, and I’m
Napoleon” I say
“Excuse me sir?”
the voice says and then repeats himself
“Sir Pedro” I say
“So you want to help me out because you’re
worried for me and my computer
and you’re doing this
because you’re a nice caring person and
wouldn’t want to
think of me upset and you want to
help me out for nothing”
“Excuse me sir? It is my job. I am Pedro”
the voice says
“And I’m Caligula” I say
“Excuse me sir?” the voice says
“Die fighting not waiting” I say
“Excuse me sir? the voice says and then
the line
suddenly
dies.