DEMONS____________________________________________

A man once said that
we can exorcise fifteen
of our own demons
but ultimately
it's the sixteenth
mother fucker
that will kill us.
I'd like to extrapolate
by saying that many of us
have a lot more than that,
but that last waiting demon
has admirable foresight.
maybe foresight sounds premeditated,
and shouldn't,
that all depends on
what you believe.
I've never met anyone
as blissful
and consequently supercilious
as those
who know exactly
what they believe in.
when there's
no room for improvement
on imperfection,
there's no deliberation
for those who
are willing to help.
I've always been
willing to help
but I won't assist them.
that occurred to me
one day
as I admired
the bricks of a castle.
a dissimilar life was once led
within those walls.
you know this
and, like me,
I hope you have realised
that this is no longer significant.
but it has more place
in this occasionally pitiful
(pessimism, I know) world
than those who care
too much
too fucking much
for the present day.
that's their sixteenth demon
right there.
That's why I replenish my way of thinking
every once in a while;
because I deserve it.
I look at people differently
even though
sometimes they don't.
I try to tell others the truth
when it is least expected
because they seem to have
a penchant for lies
or well-timed truths.
I like to think that I don't.
I see obscuring disclosure,
murmuring secrets,
a soul's thoughts,
a breathless rendezvous,
pleas and cries,
and indulging whispers
for I am delicious desperation.

COMFORTABLE______________________________________

In conversation with an elderly man,
I asked him what would make him happy.
no, scrap that, comfortable.
his answer is one I will not forget.
his actions infused their own irony
and I am convinced he meant it.
'Dying,' he said.
he wore glasses, this old man,
but his foresight was impeccable
and, as he spoke,
cigarette smoke
crept between his glasses and eyes,
fleetingly blurring his vision
so that all he could see
was nothing.

HOMELESS__________________________________________

A seemingly reputable young man
began banter
with me.
I was not concerned at first
but his ignorance
caught my interest.
our chat began
when he saw me
ordering a pint of cider
with a schnapps on the side.
this lethal combination
can be extremely benign.
'Have you got a rough one ahead?'� he asked.
'No, a few rough ones behind me,'�
was my indifferent reply.
I then heard the worthless news
about his new car
he had just acquired
and subsequently had stolen.
he seemed exceedingly angry
about the whole situation.
'The evaluation of you as a human being,'� I told him,
'is not how irate or angry you are right now,
but how soon you can get over it
and comprehend
that no matter how high you climb
or how far you run
in this farcical neighbourhood
every now and then you're better off
staying on the ground
or at the starting line.'�
on my way to the pub
an hour earlier
that very same evening,
I passed a homeless man
sitting next to his dog,
his dead dog,
with a tongue hanging
from its mouth
just far enough
to touch their filthy blanket.
I passed him by
and, like many others,
I did not give him any money.
ten yards later
I turned back to look at him
as he bowed his tired head to his dog
and began to weep
and again, like many others,
I still did not give him anything.
an hour later
this asshole
got his priorities a little skewed
and ruined my night.
he stood before me
as it rained upon him
inside.
and somewhere in the distance
a homeless man
wiped away his tears,
raised his head, and thought,
Fuck this. If it rains I don't need an umbrella'�
I'll just rise above the clouds.

DIFFERENCES_______________________________________

Again sitting at the bar
with beer often spilled
and dried hard on the polish
of the solid oak
life sustain.
as I see a tiny fly walk on this bar
I wonder how many poignant tears
have diluted the stale alcohol.
not my own.
public displays of sadness
are not for me
or anyone else I know.
but on this day
a poor fool from Donnybrook
sat next to me
and told a tale of love
a love he lost
but, in my opinion, never gained.
his girlfriend left him
for a close friend.
his unrecognisably Americanised accent
told every minuscule detail.
finally a tear fell
from this dumb fucker's eye to the bar.
it was somewhat large
and landed on the tiny fly.
his weak legs
could not break him free
and so he drowned.
to me, this was the real tragedy.


RAMBLING___________________________________________

Dublin city at seven o'clock
on a Saturday morning.
it's as if a bomb has struck
but in place of shrapnel
there's vomit.
shop shutters lift as workers arrive
for their first day
of this frenzied weekend.
the puke of drunks who are now sleeping
lies in neat globular piles on most
main streets.
this is Dublin in the new millennium.
Trinity Ball debris
walks around with hangovers
in suits and lengthy dresses
like they've lost their dignity,
direction and any hope of redemption.
the over-emphasised familiarity
of our survival
will soon be their defeat
because we are benighted,
ill-bred fuckers.
now I sit drinking a Coke
and writing in a bookshop
but in two hours I will fly to London
to meet with a publisher
who may eventually print these ramblings.
the shop I'm writing in offers newspapers to read
as I sip my drink
and the headlines are dominated
by child porn offenders, stabbings
and the war in Iraq'�
all preoccupations of our modernised country.
we've got lifetime subscriptions to tragedy'�
and more'�
I'm not meaning to sound cynical,
or even contemptuous,
but the last article I read
is adjacent to an advert for an electrical shop
selling hoovers, irons, microwaves,
things that urge us to improve ourselves
as the world on the opposite page
tears itself apart.
we're our own creators and destroyers,
I was once told
by a supposedly well-known
Dublin poet.
at this point, I don't believe
we will ever meet our initial conceptual artist,
or father if you will, but if we do
then we'll probably ask him if he needs a microwave.
''� or how about an iron? You need a hoover?
Our new range can clear your carpet of war,
paedophilia, pornography, filth, losers, drugs,
dirt, alcohol, vomit and madness in just two
washes'or your money back.'�


POWER_____________________________________________

I speculate as to how far I should go
when my own living being
is dictated by confines
such as the ones
I have always known
and been fully aware of.
almost everybody
has stood
on a cliff edge
and wondered what it would be like
to leap.
on hearing
a senseless conversation
I wonder what it would be like'�
candour, I mean.
in conversation
I wonder
where it would honestly fit in.
a man of innovative power
can never be restrained
within the limits
of a
single pasture of interest and activity.
nor can he ever be at ease
to bear the marks
and use the skill
of a single occupation.
he cannot pour his
whole supremacy
into one channel,
there is always
a reserve of power beyond the weight
of the work
which he has in hand
at the time.
wherever he may find his place
and whatever work may come to his hand
he must always
be aware
of the larger movement
of life
which engulfs
this special task.
and he must have
the consciousness
of direct relation
with that central power
of which all activities
are inadequate manifestations.

PRETENDER_________________________________________

I am not affluent
and certainly not flawless.
poetry, to me,
provides an abreaction.
I expectorate these poems
you read,
and ultimately ignore,
not for you,
but for me
and all those
critics of a censorious disposition
who still believe
in poetry
and hopefully
do not read mine.

PASSIVE____________________________________________

If I could walk forever
in spite of exhaustion
I'd do it
split the world apart
with my fervour
for that which you will never know.
if I could run ceaselessly
in spite of you
and exhaustion
I'd pass you by
because I've seen it all before.
I'll look right through you
as you look into and beyond me.
I can run faster than you
because I know exactly how you run.
I can pass you by
and take no notice
because I know unerringly
where you are going.

NAKED______________________________________________

The world was fully clothed
until someone came into my days
to help me
disrobe it.
now it stands before us, naked.
there are things we haven't seen yet,
and never will
unless collectively,
because only our shared acuity
can remove the fig leaf.
and some day soon
when we are considered worthy,
we will both stand naked
before a fully clothed world.
when this happens
we will not feel bare,
but admired and stripped of nothing.
any eyes upon us will admire
respect
envy
desire
ache
and yearn to be blissful.

INDEFINITE__________________________________________

They're diminishing all around me,
the unwanted, those bitter fuel-less individuals.
they want no more than me but don't realise who's got it.
in my tenure, it would be my first secret.
immeasurable, dislocated youth knocking down my door.
maybe I have it, perhaps we all have it.
knocking down a wall from the inside out.
from inside what?
they are fearful.
less anxiety,
trepidation, apprehension.
the indefinite is to them
their reason to die.
and after they die, it's their reason to live.

HIDING______________________________________________

On a train to work
this morning
I hid my head
behind a John Fante novel
free from impurity or decay
for just one moment.
Abnormal, spasmodic worry
led me to look
at the faces of those around me
commuters
husbands
wives
sons
daughters
all bright and early
for a lesson
they may never learn.
they are the
unknowingly frivolous
and unfathomable creatures
I hear so much about.
no incivility,
just tedium.
they talk amongst themselves
usually in pairs
about nothing,
nothing at all.
they know this
but have yet to tell
the one they see in the mirror.
unfortunately
I hated everything I could see
from that place
behind my book
but it's all I had.

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