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Poetry by Milner Place 

Milner Place lives in Huddersfield, England.  His 7th poetry collection, Caminante, is his most recent work - released by Wrecking Ball Press (www.wreckingballpress.com).  He has also written The City of Flowers, Piltdown Man and Batwoman, In A Rare Time of Rain, etc.

                         

© 2003  Milner Place

Non-UK folk can buy Caminante 

directly from the author at milner@place007.fsnet.co.uk  

for a quotation in any currency.

 

 

 

ROLL OVER VIVALDI

 

Spring

 

He said the snow has melted from the fells.

 

When a gale blows against the tide I said

the sea will tumble like those jagged clouds

on Blackbrow Crag. Dust in the sky

puts haloes round the sun and stormy petrels

gathering in the wake's a sign of warning

to a labouring ship of worse to come.

 

He said the daffodils have gone.

 

Saladin the Saracen I said was hot

at putting Christians in their places,

a holy terror to Crusaders, stretching

them in holy ground. It must have come

as quite a shock to be filleted  by a Moor.

News from the Middle East these days

just shows how little things have changed.

 

He said the cherry blossoms soon will bloom.

 

Summer

 

He said I don't sweat the way I did.

 

A dancing bee I said is smart

telling the others in the hive just where

to find the loot that tastes so sweet

quicker than pirates with a chart

and a black-hulled brig with a bone

in its teeth, a jolly roger on its jack.

 

He said they say the poles are melting fast.

 

It's curious I said that cranes build nests

on chimney stacks and have no fear

of boys with matches, no dread it seems

of rising phoenix-wise, clutches

of eggs all poached, arses on fire

soaring like rockets to the sky.

 

He said flamingos make strange nests.


Autumn

 

He said the nights are drawing in.

 

I said the moonlight on the pond last night

was bright and when it ducked into a cloud

some stars to south shone through the beams

of Bumstead's barn, a ghost owl flew

from the shadow of an oak that soon

would shed its leaves like grandma's hair.

 

He said it could be icy later.

 

Lupins I said that flowered pink

were worshipped in the ancient world

as phalluses of Pan the god

who fawned on every nubile girl

he met while walking in the woods.

So lupins grow not flowers but pricks.

That's to remember when you visit Greece.

 

Air fares he said in autumn can be cheap.

 

Winter

 

He said the forecast's for some snow tonight.

 

The cold I said creeps into bones

and augurs rotting flesh that's why

the raven is the bird of death and when

you hear a buzzing in the ears it may

be flies that gather for the feast.

 

Cheer up he said tomorrow's a new year.

 

A day, a month, a year, a life I said

are ripples in a monstrous stream,

a tide that sweeps the stars around,

a minuet in a Catherine wheel.

Time has no purpose when you're dead.

 

It isn't long to Spring he said.

 

 

HE SAID THERE'S NOTHING

 

concentrates the mind

like a health inspector.

 

I said wolves.

 

He said what wolves.

 

Wolves I said concentrate

the mind wonderfully,

it's something in the howl.

 

He said gibberish.

 

No, wolves.

 

Gladys, he called

the length of the bar,

don't serve this one

any more.

 

 

 

 

ATLANTIS

 

they know it's there

         I know, the trouble

is

    they keep moving

it around

                inching it

past

each generation's wall

        of knowledge, bricks

of straw and mud

soft

as the ocean's

detritus, the roofs

       always two fathoms

below the diver's

aspiration

       always beyond

the next field

of kelp

 

 

 

(see more)

 

 

 

 

 

All work is property of Milner Place.  © 2003.

 

 

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