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2 poems by Martin Stannard

from POEMS TRUE, FALSE, AND UNABLE TO BE VERIFIED


A typical day, relatively speaking

The North on my back, absence of Sun, perpetual night

Nankeen pants badly soiled, never to be worn with pride again

I have imaginary mental issues the same as everyone else

But the world insists upon carrying on

I applied to the monks but the monks wouldn't have me, refusing to bend

I fall short of their exacting criteria

Monks might've been expected to be more flexible

But the commandments are carved into stone


Never mind: I'm winning at the table cricket

And flowing blond locks render one ridiculously attractive but I'm not easy

The last time I was a fool for love I dropped the mirror

Predictably society builds a by-pass around me

I await a Saviour; He’ll show up one day, it’s been foretold

Sullenly a man outside my immediate circle looks in at me full of reproach

I’m treading unhallowed turf, but articles of faith are available

To be able to tolerate this one has to adopt several wearying strategies

For I am a flower, able to blossom fully

Only under certain carefully controlled conditions


I nurse the last glass of rioja, stare at the empty bottle

No matter how long I stare it stays empty, refusing to change its mind

I cast smoke rings into the vacancy

After every endeavour it comes down to this:

Listening to the wind and its voice not talking to me, talking about me

The sun's sinking across the road, there's life somewhere

While I'm in a book I haven't written

O major domo, I think it’s your worn and weathered face

That’s been haunting the hours of my sleeping

And when the box of cloud is delivered to the breakfast table

What is the song that always comes to mind?

I hear the martins in the eaves, they’re storytellers rather than songsters

Telling me to find a house, somewhere to live quietly for ever


from POEMS OPTIMISTIC, PESSIMISTIC, AND FANTASTICAL


The dissolving man is up to his neck in sparkly water

listening to the sky that will say what it has to say once

and that's it. Listen: distilled air, and digitized

birdsong that will one day be stored in alphabetical order

and kept under lock and key. If Providence has its way

it's the demented gardener will get to determine everything,

everything Everyman needs for ascension to where everything

is always available in season, while wise men sit and wait

patiently. Down here, all you think you want can be had for

a price, all so slick and therefore all the more desirable.


I nurture fond memories of a distant world in the past,

while in the pantry there’s a good supply of cheap splosh,

for a single man at the latter end of his days may find

himself sat waiting for his washing to be done and watching

the launderette lady looking askance at some dirty children.

Mrs. Baxter says to put them in the washer. Intent upon

recovering romance, I try to compose a serenade for love

although it can only ever be a pale shadow of the real thing.

The Conjuror pipes up: “To conjure is to do that which

The Great Manipulator created me to do,” he says, and all

who heard him speak knew he spoke Truth. It's incredible but

this is only in a book among the words and what they say.

You can say anything you want to say because nobody’s

listening. Yes, the trees are in bud. The land is fertile.


It's written in The Testament that if you’re a good boy

you likely won't get emerods in your secret parts; even

might the sun shine from out of there. Algernon Swinburne

was beaten by professional ladies in establishments in

St. John's Wood. If there is a God, silently watching from

somewhere, God knows what he’s thinking. Improbability has

invaded randomness. But against the odds we're pretty happy,

smiling like snow. Take my withered hand in your gloved mitt,

and here we go out of the window into the too white thrall.

So brilliant. The more of this the better, a caress for all.


_______________

Martin Stannard lives in quiet retirement in Nottingham with his cat, Xiao Mei. Details of his books, whims and private life etc. can be found at www.martinstannard.com

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