- from Celanie (2010)
- Lunch [after Lady Daibu & Lydia Ginzburg] (28/4-11/7/10)
- Mr Lennon [after Charles Darwin] (3/5-11/7/10)
- Maggie’s Farm [after Ian McEwan & Margaret Thatcher] (4/5-16/7/10)
- Badlands [after Jonathan Raban] (22/4-16/7/10)
- Hamilton Stations of the Cross (23/4-7/5/11)
- Britain's Missing Top Model (23-7/5/11)
- Shorts:
- At the Magician's House (23/4-9/5/11)
- Destructive Element (3/2-9/5/11)
- Dollarton (8/2/11)
- Petition (8/2-9/5/11)
- Cook on Easter Island (12-16/5/11)
- Dark Night Reading in Titirangi (1/8/11)
- Oracle Couplets (26/8-30/9/11)
- Haiku:
- Shambling (7/9/11)
- CARIB 4WD (7/9/11)
- Peach blossom (12/10/11)
- The Nightingale (after Marie de France) (31/10/11-14/1/12)
- [Guillaume Apollinaire]: Poèmes à Lou, XXII: Poème du 9 février 1915 (2012)
- from Jueju (2013)
- Red Cliffs (after Su Shi) (6/9-17/10/13)
- Returning to Auckland after Dark (after Su Shi) (6/9-1/10/13)
- Spring Morning (after Li Qing Zhao) (6/9-1/10/13)
- Rural Life (after Xin Qi Ji) (6/9-1/10/13)
- Wallace Stevens Meets the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang (6/9-1/10/13)
- The Counterfeiters (2-9/11/13)
Reading these letters doubled with poems is also to delimit the space where Celan habitually deployed his language, and which he referred to – not entirely seriously – as his “Celanie”: the Rue des Ecoles, the Rue de Lota, the Rue de Montevideo, the Rue de Longchamp, the Rue d’Ulm, the Rue Cabanis (Faculty Clinic, Saint-Anne), the Rue Tournefort and Avenue Émile Zola …
– Bertrand Badiou, “Notice Editoriale”. In Paul Celan & Gisèle Celan-Lestrange. Correspondance (1951-1970). 2 vols. Librairie du XXIe siècle (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 2001): 2: 10.
- Lunch [after Lady Daibu & Lydia Ginzburg] (28/4-11/7/10)
- Three fits (6/4-16/7/10)
- Mr Lennon [after Charles Darwin] (3/5-11/7/10)
- Substitutes only need apply (12/4-18/6/09)
- Maggie’s Farm [after Ian McEwan & Margaret Thatcher] (4/5-16/7/10)
- “The archaeologist of the present day” (5/4-18/6//09)
- Badlands [after Jonathan Raban] (22/4-16/7/10)
- April Fool’s Day (1/4-18/6/09)
- Leave [after Paul Celan] (8/2-25/4/10)
(24-25/8/10)
Publications:
- "Celanie.” All Together Now: A Digital Bridge for Auckland and Sydney / Kia Kotahi Rā: He Arawhata Ipurangi mō Tamaki Makau Rau me Poihākena (March-September 2010).
[After Lady Daibu & Lydia Ginzburg] Such was the upheaval in our world at the time of Juei and Genryaku that whatever I may call it – dream, illusion, tragedy – no words can possibly describe it: the lull of the siege day. What can I say, what am I to feel about that autumn when I heard that those whom I knew were soon to be leaving the capital? Lunch was always a break. None of us had known when it might happen, and faced with the actual event, we were all stunned, those of us who saw it with our own eyes and those who heard about it from afar. The earlier lunches cut across the day. At that time, when all was in uproar and such disquieting rumours were reaching us, Sukemori was a First Secretary to the Emperor and seemed to have little time away from his duties. Lunch brings with it not only indolence and drowsiness, but also a sense of the onset of decrepitude, old age, exhaustion, the dying of the day. On these occasions he would tell me, just as though it were a normal thing to say: “These troubles have now reached the point where there can be no doubt that I, too, shall number among the dead.” Now that people were in primitive dependence on time, the feeling of the dying day was especially concrete. In the post-lunch depression the sense of over-satiety was now replaced by disappointment, and an exasperation brought on by the swiftness of lunch. Tears were my only reply.
(28/4-11/7/10)
Publications:
- "Celanie.” All Together Now: A Digital Bridge for Auckland and Sydney / Kia Kotahi Rā: He Arawhata Ipurangi mō Tamaki Makau Rau me Poihākena (24/8/10).
•
[After Charles Darwin] Started at midday for Mr Lennon's estate the road passed through a vast extent of forest on the road we saw many beautiful birds The slaves here appeared miserably over-worked & badly clothed we were obliged to have a black man clear the way with a sword On arriving at the estate there was a most violent & disagreeable quarrel between Mr Lennon & his agent which quite prevented us from wishing to remain there (In the evening it rained very hard I suffered from the cold) During Mr. Lennon's quarrel with his agent he threatened to sell at public auction an illegitimate mulatto child to whom Mr Cowper was much attached There's a more sinister way of looking at it yet I will pledge myself that in humanity Mr Lennon is above the common run of men
(3/5-11/7/10)
Publications:
- "Celanie.” All Together Now: A Digital Bridge for Auckland and Sydney / Kia Kotahi Rā: He Arawhata Ipurangi mō Tamaki Makau Rau me Poihākena (24/8/10).
•
[After Ian McEwan & Margaret Thatcher]
How can a novelist achieve atonement when, with her absolute
power of deciding outcomes, she is also God?
I have a problem, it is the Government's job to cope with it!
In her imagination she has set the limits and the terms
I have a problem, I will go and get a grant to cope with it!
There is no one, no entity or higher form that she can appeal to,
or be reconciled with, or that can forgive her
I am homeless, the Government must house me!
There is nothing outside
Who is society? There is no such thing!
No atonement for God, or novelists, even if they are atheist
People look to themselves first
It was always an impossible task, and that was precisely the point
Life is a reciprocal business
& people have got the entitlements too much in mind
without the obligations
(4/5-16/7/10)
Publications:
- "Celanie.” All Together Now: A Digital Bridge for Auckland and Sydney / Kia Kotahi Rā: He Arawhata Ipurangi mō Tamaki Makau Rau me Poihākena (24/8/10).
•
[After Jonathan Raban] Aged 47 he chucked up everything & just cleared off Lacking a past of his own he hoped to find a history that would fit A dead woodpecker on the floor mud-igloos on the walls • The letters B L M – Bureau of Land Management – are recorded several times On page 3 of the ledger a ringed figure shows up like a Homeric epithet How do you turn 2.54 debit into five thousand, six hundred & eighty-eight dollars ninety? • To lay a floor like that was the work of a true believer These houses prairie schooners lonely derelicts awash in grass a nest for the neighbourhood birds
(22-27/4/10)
Publications:
- "Celanie.” All Together Now: A Digital Bridge for Auckland and Sydney / Kia Kotahi Rā: He Arawhata Ipurangi mō Tamaki Makau Rau me Poihākena (24/8/10).
•
Around Station 10
I found myself
boxed in
by a baby carriage
as the crowd
filled up
behind in front
a water-maze
outlined
by floating lights
with a soprano
singing
something from Mozart's
Requiem
I felt
as I once felt
in Bangalore at
that shrine
to the elephant-headed
god Ganesha
trapped
in the crush
lost soul
unable
to breathe
(23-7/5/11)
Publications:
- The Winding Stair. Ed. Ila Selwyn & Lesley Smith. Titirangi: Lopdell House, 2011. 22-23.
•
I've only got one hand I'd like to be a fashion model Trying on her jeans she finds a rip on the morning of her interview with the Agency This day can only go uphill from here heroic nervous to the point of near-paralysis she manages to smile at the brusque no-nonsense manager embrace the team sit quietly while they critique her 32 23 35 (too hippy) 23 (too old) & then debate her fate cries when they say they'll represent her I need to tell my Mum
(23-7/5/11)
Publications:
- Britain’s Missing Top Model. Poem by Jack Ross. Design by Bronwyn Lloyd. Pania Singles 2. Auckland: Pania Press, December 25, 2011.
- Poetry Specials: 2008-2018. Papyri (28/12/2017)
•
Shorts
In the destructive element immerse
– Joseph Conrad (1897)
Karl's premonition at the waterfall Let's leave It's awful here A week later they heard on Sensing Murder there'd been 3 bodies found there
(23/4-9/5/11)
Publications:
- The Winding Stair. Ed. Ila Selwyn & Lesley Smith. Titirangi: Lopdell House, 2011. 22-23.
•
CYCLONE BABY BEING BORN IN CAIRNS The baby will not be called Yasi said the English midwife Akiko does n't like that name at all She added that the parents didn't know the sex yet but expected it to be born in the next few hours
(3/2-9/5/11)
Publications:
- The Winding Stair. Ed. Ila Selwyn & Lesley Smith. Titirangi: Lopdell House, 2011. 22-23.
- "Lounge Room Tribalism." Interlitq 16 (7 August, 2011) [available at http://interlitq.org/issue16/jack-ross/job.php].
•
You see the dilem ma? on the one hand our instinctive o beisance to Na ture John Cowper Po wys nodding to the stones Malcolm Lowry identifying with the survival of his pier at Dol larton a facile kinship with the de structive element designed to keep it out side in the storm
(8/2/11)
Publications:
- "Lounge Room Tribalism." Interlitq 16 (7 August, 2011) [available at http://interlitq.org/issue16/jack-ross/job.php].
•
You are duty bound to help the activities are malicious menacing & happening now do not rely on other people I am in fear of my life I am seeking justice for my stolen life I am open to all offers of assistance telecoms and industry bodies must stop all polluting frequency use fix this problem now this is a legal demand
(8/2-9/5/11)
Publications:
- "Lounge Room Tribalism." Interlitq 16 (7 August, 2011) [available at http://interlitq.org/issue16/jack-ross/job.php].
•
The island is full of statues some in groups on platforms of masonry others fixed in the earth & that not deep the shade of one of these a little past two o'clock was sufficient to shelter nearly thirty persons we saw not an animal of any sort & but few birds the captain determined to sail the next morning since nothing was to be obtained that could make it worth his while to stay
(12-16/5/11)
Publications:
- Poetry NZ 44 (2012): 83-84.
Notes:
- Source: Captain Cook’s Voyages of Discovery. Ed. John Barrow. 1860. Everyman’s Library, 99. 1906. Introduction by G. N. Pocock. 1941. London: J. M. Dent & Sons / New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1954. 162-63..
•
Reading in Titirangi La noche oscura
The song of some souls who felt Canciones del alma que
pretty chuffed to have reached se goza de haber llegado
that high state of perfection al alto estado de la
which consists of being asked perfección, que es la
(& paid!) to read out your own unión con Dios, por el
poetry in public, then have it camino de la negación
reprinted in a special limited- espiritual.
edition chapbook ...
In the late afternoon En una noche oscura,
anxious about rush-hour traffic con ansias en amores inflamada,
(not to mention the parking!) (¡oh dichosa ventura!)
we drove off to Devonport salí sin ser notada,
to pick up Michele Leggott estando ya mi casa sosegada.
Fortunately she was ready A oscuras y segura,
already & even agreed por la secreta escala disfrazada,
to leave Olive behind (¡oh dichosa ventura!)
since there was so little room a oscuras y en celada,
in the car for a guide-dog estando ya mi casa sosegada.
On the motorway En la noche dichosa,
no-one noticed en secreto, que nadie me veía,
as I chose the wrong turn-off ni yo miraba cosa,
& had to go round again sin otra luz ni guía
to find the right exit sino la que en el corazón ardía.
Bronwyn was determined Aquésta me guïaba
to check out the exhibitions más cierta que la luz del mediodía,
in the Lopdell House Gallery adonde me esperaba
I’d set my sights quien yo bien me sabía,
on Murray Gray’s bookshop en parte donde nadie parecía.
O Café that welcomed us! ¡Oh noche que me guiaste!,
O waiter who made such a song & dance ¡oh noche amable más que el alborada!,
over pouring out wine! ¡oh noche que juntaste
O elegant curly fries amado con amada,
& soft, buttery loaves! amada en el amado transformada!
When we finally roused ourselves En mi pecho florido,
to tool off to the venue que entero para él solo se guardaba,
in the ramshackle old lift allí quedó dormido,
we found half the punters y yo le regalaba,
flushed & loud on mulled wine y el ventalle de cedros aire daba.
The musicians on stage El aire de la almena,
were strumming & bashing cuando yo sus cabellos esparcía,
their drums & guitars con su mano serena
so we settled in en mi cuello hería,
for a bit of a siege y todos mis sentidos suspendía.
I found after a while Quedéme y olvidéme,
I was starting to enjoy it el rostro recliné sobre el amado,
even after the crowd heckled cesó todo, y dejéme,
my attempts dejando mi cuidado
to speak French entre las azucenas olvidado.
In the late evening En una noche oscura,
avoiding the rush con ansias en amores inflamada,
from the Lopdell House carpark (¡oh dichosa ventura!)
we drove back from Titirangi salí sin ser notada,
to drop off Michele estando ya mi casa sosegada.
We got back to the flat A oscuras y segura,
more dead than alive por la secreta escala disfrazada,
to find the cat yawning (¡oh dichosa ventura!)
(unaware we’d been gone!) a oscuras y en celada,
so we turned off the lights estando ya mi casa sosegada.
& crawled straight into bed – San Juan de la Cruz
(1577-78)
(1/8/11)
•
- Disappointment is forever. Hope renews itself each day.
- Remember the tennis court oath: No Right Turn!
- Only deceit can come from deceitful mouths
- Look outwards. Great opportunities await.
- The horizon rises and falls but the path is certain
- As Spring approaches cracks appear in the ice.
- Hover on the wind – that is your element.
- The voice has faltered But the talking cure goes on.
- A migrating bird makes its nest on the waves of the sea.
- Enough, or too much? Turn the mirror around.
- A thousand blessings fall on the soul that dares.
- Industry is its own reward Make and do.
- Turning your face from the name. Turning your feet from the path.
- Ask the Dream Oracle in the Mirror World about your second self.
- The path that forks off from the narrow way traverses mountains.
- When the horizon is obscured, it’s raining. When the horizon is clear, it’s going to rain.
- The stick insect walks on the surface of the flowing stream.
- On a foggy day sightlines stretch forever.
- The mind is a diamond shining despite its setting.
- A direct gaze scares off the timid approach.
- Acting on the impossible. Living on the slope of the volcano.
- Look above the landscape Follow the hurrying clouds.
- Handle a hundred pieces of jade Cherish a thousand handfuls of air
- The power of stillness resists the waves of the sea.
- The nose is not the issue. Look for the cause elsewhere.
- The only ghosts that frighten you come from within.
- In the black forest you wait for a word in the heart.
- The long view is the true view. Raise your head.
- The change you desire is around the very next bend.
- The dead have no desires. Rain has no memory.
- The quiver holds six arrows. All will be required.
- In a thousand futures everything comes to pass.
- You ask a question to hear what you know already.
- A rock feels what it can feel - memories of fire.
- Fear besets the barque of the years. The sun comes up and turns the ocean to gold.
- Writing in moonlight ink freezes on the tip of your pen.
- The sickle reaps the field it has sown. A thousand blows cannot disturb the tower of hands.
- The Persian King wept when he thought in a hundred years his army would all be dead.
- Interrogate your dreams. How many corridors do you walk down in sleep?
- When you wake up are you a butterfly dreaming you are human?
- None of us deserves anything. All of us deserve everything.
- The act of asking a question sets ripples in motion across the stillest pond.
- The cat lies in the sun then shifts into the shadow.
- Don’t hurry the seasons. Wait till the Spring has come.
- A life is a long time. Be happy underground.
- It seems to look into the street. Its eyes are glass.
- The Monkey King was pinned under the mountain for a thousand years. He did not learn contentment.
- Your reward is coming soon. It will be what you need.
- Your question emphasises doubt. Don’t act as if you feel it.
- Beauty is a firefly in the night. A speck of ash in a furnace.
- Long enough to do all that you need to do.
- Your love will last. Its object may be the same.
- Whatever you achieve brings joy with it and sorrow.
- The ant burrows in the side of the hill. A pebble is a mountain to him.
- The bird flies above the hill. All it discerns is movement.
- The change has come already. Open your eyes.
- In the midst of pain one can still feel the desire to know more.
- Words are hard to trust in. They tell you more than you seek to know.
- There is no safety. There is only life.
- Clear your mind. Don’t try to steer the void.
- If your heart is in what you do energy will be given.
- Tigers cannot be tamed. The jungle is their home.
- The baby is a source of joy. Joy transforms everything.
- To be still in the middle of stillness To act in the midst of change.
- Watch your sister’s eyes. See what they follow.
- Step further back. Don’t ask ‘could’ but ‘should’.
- The fabric of the night shadows all who stand under it.
- Ask and it will be given Under the protection
- Give back what you’re given Don’t hold back.
- Speech sounds harsh after silence. Persevere.
- A fish lives in the water. Can it be successful on dry land?
- Change of skies denotes a change of heart.
- Ice moves across a scoured landscape. Lichen grows on the rocks.
- You’ve already left. Look around before you close the door.
- Your joy will be accompanied by grief. How else would you know the difference?
- The cicada’s song stops when you get too near.
- Try giving it away Then you’ll see.
- Happiness lies in yourself not in what you own.
- At a quantum level nothing can be known for sure.
- The goldfish swims around the bowl and meets itself.
- Your paths diverge in the forest. Who knows if they will meet again?
- The roots of the birch tree spread further than you can know.
- Write a letter to yourself White tracks in the snow
- Swans guard their lake. Learn to be a swan.
- Only when you are lost can you start to see the way.
- The water sits at the bottom of the well The weight of the mountain cannot move it.
- Joy in the world outside Trust in the world within
- Clear your mind Open your eyes behind their lids
- Red is the colour of riches Gold is the colour of spring
- If you walk far enough You'll meet yourself returning
- Open the door Walk out into the garden
- Follow the circle round and round You'll never find an end
- Don't look at the summit Climb one ridge at a time
- One law for the All Black or the reject is expectation
- At the end of a year the project turns back on itself
- The word enlarges The 'I' becomes an 'eye'
- Walk in the forest until you find a clearing
- Nothing stays the same Change or die
- Solder the broken wire It will come out stronger
- From inside the mirror reflections seem like shadows
- A pouty face sees nothing but itself.
- Be a wolf in the night A seashell in the day
- We accept your libation A drop of wine for the fates
(26/8-30/9/11)
Publications:
- Lugosi's Children. Curated by Bronwyn Lloyd (Auckland: Objectspace, 27/8-1/10/2011).
•
Haiku:
across the road looking at nothing except your phone
(7/9/11)
•
As enjoyable as communing with Nature is the comfort of cruising through the tree-line boulevard
(7/9/11)
•
on the windscreen as we set off to work
(12/10/11)
•
(after Marie de France) The story that I’ll tell today the Bretons made into a lay: Laüstic they called the tale French rossignol – or nightingale. By Saint Malo there was a town famed far and wide, of great renown. Two knights lived there in luxury: fine houses, servants, horses, money. One had married a lady fair wise, discreet and debonair (she kept her temper wonderfully considering her company). The other was a bachelor well known among the townsfolk there for his courage and his courtesy and for treating people honourably. He went to all the tournaments, (neglecting solider investments) and loved the wife of his neighbour. He begged so many boons from her she felt he had to be deserving and loved him more than anything – as much for the good he’d done before as for the fact he lived next door. Wisely and well they loved each other avoiding undue fuss and bother by keeping everything discreet. This was the way they managed it: because their houses stood side by side there wasn’t much they couldn’t hide behind those solid walls of stone. The lady, when she was alone, would go to the window of her room and lean across to talk to him. They swapped small tokens of their love: he from below, she from above. Nothing interfered with them. No-one noticed, or poked blame. However, they could not aspire to reach the peak of their desire because there was so strict a guard on all her movements. It was hard, but still they had the consolation of leaning out in any season to exchange sighs across the gap. No-one could stop that access up. They loved each other for so long that summer came – green buds, birdsong: the orchards waxed into full bloom bringing amorous airs with them, and little birds carolled their joy from the tip of every spray. The knight and lady of whom I speak felt their resistance growing weak – when love wafts out from every flower it’s no surprise you feel it more! At night, when the moon shone outside, she’d leave her husband sleeping, glide wrapped only in a mantle, till she fetched up at the window sill. Her lover did the selfsame thing, sat by his window pondering, and there he’d watch her half the night. This simple act gave them delight. So often did she do it that her husband started to smell a rat. He asked her where she went at night and why she rose before first light. “Sir,” the lady said to him, “It’s more than just a passing whim. I hear the nightingale sing and have to sit here listening. So sweet his voice is in the night to hear it is supreme delight, the joy it gives me is so deep I can’t just close my eyes and sleep.” Her husband heard this glib reply and laughed once: coarsely, angrily. He thought at once of thwarting her by catching the bird in a snare. his serving men were rounded up and put to work on net and trap to hang on every single tree in his entire property. They wove so many strings and glue the bird was caught without ado. When the nightingale was caught they brought it living to the knight. This exploit pleased him mightily; he went at once to see his lady. “Lady,” said he, “where are you? Come here; this concerns you too. I’ve snared that little bird, whose song has been keeping you awake so long. Now you can sleep the whole night through, Rest easy: he won’t bother you.” When the lady heard him speak, she felt crestfallen and heart-sick. She asked a favour of her lord, if she could have the little bird. At that he did something macabre, snapped its neck in front of her, and threw the body at her dress to bloody it above the breast. Then he stalked out of her door. The lady picked it from the floor, and sobbing, called a living curse on those who’d made her prison worse by hanging nets in every tree to snare the bird who set her free. “Alas,” said she, “I am undone! I can no longer rise alone and sit by the window every night to watch my lover, my sweet knight. There is one thing I’m certain of: He will believe he’s lost my love unless I tell him what’s occurred. By sending him the little bird I’ll warn him of what’s befallen me.” She wrapped it in embroidery and cloth of gold, and asked a page to deliver this last little package to her friend who lived next door. The page walked over to their neighbour, saluted him on her behalf, and gave what he’d been asked to give: the bird’s body, the lady’s message. When he understood the damage his love had done to this lady the young man did not take it lightly. He had a cup made out of gold, studded with precious stones, and sealed against the corrosive outer air. He put the nightingale in there, then shut it in its little tomb and took it everywhere with him. The tale could not be hidden long so it was made into a song. Breton poets tell the tale; they call it “The Nightingale.”
(31/10/11-14/1/12)
Publications:
- "Marie de France: ‘Laüstic’ (c.1180).” Ka Mate Ka Ora. ISSN 1177-2182. 11 (30/3/2012): 75-88.
- "Marie de France: ‘Laüstic’ (c.1180).” Jack Ross: Opinions (1/7/2013)
•
Reconnais-toi Recognise yourself cette adorable personne c’est toi this adorable person is you sous le grand chapeau caroline under the big Carolina hat oeil eye nez nose la bouche mouth voici l’ovale de la figure here is the oval of your face ton cou your neck et puis and then un peu plus bas a bit lower down c’est ton coeur qui bat there’s your beating heart ni nor ci confus should we mix with it l’impure the impure par le mirage through the mirage de ton buste adoré of your loved breast un comma a comma à travers un nuage through a cloud
- trans. Jack Ross (2012)
Publications:
- 139.123: Creative Writing – Administration Guide / Book of Readings (Massey University: School of Social and Cultural Studies, 2006-21): 2012 et seq.
- Guillaume Apollinaire: Poèmes à Lou, XXII: "Poème du 9 février 1915.” The Imaginary Museum (30/3/2026)
•
Xu Yuan Zhong, trans. Golden Treasury of Chinese Lyrics:Chinese-English / Chinese Phonetic Alphabet (1990)
(2013)
lyrics were originally songs written to a certain tune by unknown authors for beautiful songstresses to sing in wine shops or at farewell banquets
– Xu Yuan Zhong, Golden Treasury of Chinese Lyrics
- Transcultural Imaginaries (for Yang Lian) (18-23/6/13)
- Make-Up (after Wen Tingyun) (6/9-1/10/13)
- On City Streets (after Wang Anshi) (6/9-30/10/13)
- Hunting in Palmerston (after Su Shi) (6/9-17/10/13)
- 40 Bogan Anthems (after Axl Rose) (24/8-5/9/13)
- Red Cliffs (after Su Shi) (6/9-17/10/13)
- Returning to Auckland after Dark (after Su Shi) (6/9-1/10/13)
- Inferno 13 (after Dante Alighieri) (21/8-1/10/13)
- Spring Morning (after Li Qing Zhao) (6/9-1/10/13)
- Rural Life (after Xin Qi Ji) (6/9-1/10/13)
- Thinking of My Father (after Liu Ke Zhang) (6/9-17/10/13)
(after Su Shi)
The Empire, long divided, must unite; long united, must divide.
– Luo Guanzhong
I watched Red Cliff
the movie that is
subtitled hard to follow
for those unacquainted with
The Three Kingdoms
the Peach Garden Oath
the Empire divided
into South & East & West
Disgraceful really
to fixate on such things
when the mud-walls roll down
to carry whole towns away
when the last home left
is besieged by taxmen
when the heroes of Tiananmen
Square
lie in their rows
forgiven
not forgotten
as the Corrs would say
(6/9-17/10/13)
•
(after Su Shi)
their theme is usually parting and sorrow of lonely woman
– Xu Yuan Zhong
Drinking at evening in the airport bar
I try the pinot gris then the Monteiths
the Jetstar flight’s on time surprise surprise
even a little early maybe
will Bronwyn be awake
when I get home?
or Zero perhaps
– less liable to forgive
my absences?
What can I do but listen to the sea
pounding on Mairangi Bay beach
like the hum of the supermarket
air-conditioning units?
audible strangely
halfway up the hill
rather than where we are
She’s off herself
on Saturday morning
Zero & I
will hold the fort alone
(6/9-1/10/13)
Publications:
- "The Zero Suite." Papyri (2/5/23)
•
(after Li Qing Zhao)
The lyric, an expression of the human heart and mind, and of
human perception of the world, is one path leading to an
understanding of beauty and goodness.
– Miao Yueh
The red should languish
& the green should grow
on the crab-apple tree
she said
I’m forced to remind myself
of Jack Reacher’s rules
There aren’t any
Spem successus alit
success breeds hope
or failure, for that matter
languid reflections
this side
of the blind
(6/9-1/10/13)
•
(after Xin Qi Ji)
I was the giant great and still
That sits upon the pillow-hill,
And sees before him, dale and plain,
The pleasant land of counterpane.
– Robert Louis Stevenson
Missing a wedding is nothing
to be proud of
but when you have a good excuse
like a hastily improvised
trip to Melbourne
for a ‘cultural weekend’
you feel somehow absolved
of the need to account
for your actions
even when
you’ve been planning this evasion
for months for years
if you like
& are living up to your rep
(once again)
as the ‘irresponsible ones’
(6/9-1/10/13)
•
Let be be finale of seem
– The Emperor of Ice-Cream
Who’s to say it couldn’t have happened?
the young Wallace Stevens
born in 1879
in Reading, Pennsylvania
might well have travelled out west
sometime before going to Harvard
in the Fall of ’97
It wasn’t till 1896
on his release
from Wyoming State Prison
that Butch Cassidy
put together the Wild Bunch
(Stevens was 17)
It wasn’t till 1901
that he and Etta Place & the Sundance Kid
left for South America
(Stevens was 22)
It wasn’t till 1908
he was shot down
in San Vicente, Bolivia
(Stevens was 29)
It wasn’t till 1916
that he moved to Hartford
becoming Vice President
of the of Hartford Accident & Indemnity Company
in 1934
(6/9-1/10/13)
Publications:
- "Wallace Stevens Meets the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang". The Imaginary Museum (14/10/2013)
- "Library Dreaming: Wallace Stevens Meets the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang." The Ultimate Reader of Love for the Book: An Anthology of Writers Deeply Concerned about Massive Book Disposals occurring at the National Library of New Zealand / Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa (the wellsprings of knowledge). Ed. William (Bill) Direen. ISSN 1953-1427. NZ: Phantom Billstickers, 2021: 34.
Notes:
- An interesting sidelight is thrown on the events recorded in this poem by the article "Saved by Florida Cowboys", by Wallace Stevens. Atlanta Journal Magazine, May 31, 1931.
•
All New Zealand poetry
is crap
said David Howard's pal
on our ritual roadtrip north
to the Unicorn Bookshop
Warkworth
Oh I don't know There's Smithyman
Curnow
He wasn't impressed
Most
of you are trying to be as good
as Jenny or Bill not Homer or
Virgil
I had to admit he had
a point but what street-cred did
he have?
He'd spent the whole journey
wanking on
about André Gheed ...
(2-9/11/13)
Publications:
- "Hawkes Bay Poetry Conference (November 1-3)". The Imaginary Museum (9/11/2013)
•
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