Year: 2011
Road Works [poem]
I am lost but strangely calm and unpointed
like liquid mercury on a slopey surface
reflecting the slightness of being and seeing
and reeling and feeling with secondhand
dealing I fill with unrealised urges
I am wound but weirdly free from all harming
like sprigs of lichen on a barkless tree
expecting a dewfall of sighing and highing
while wining and dining on sunaround
shining I feel like a heart amputee
Inklings [sonnet]
I chased you down through barren tracts of time
although your name I no more could recall.
Some strange fragmented memories sublime
were mingled full with passion’s rise and fall.
If there is truth in inklings vaguely known
that parted were we by some tragic fate
while in another world where we had flown
then we must not revisit that estate.
For though we meet on history’s heavy wings
which waft with air so thick with ancient pains
another chance our present meeting brings
so we may now break free from astral chains.
If we to this our hearts can wholly give
then we will soar to heights superlative.
© 2011, Alan Morrison
One Huge We [poem]
Sometimes questions come into my head
for which I have no easy answer and
from which I cannot run (though feet
move fast and life is like a blur of
clouds [sky overcast] they loom like
darkened shrouds of knowledge that
I’d rather never know [although to
dreaded places lately I must ghostly go]).
Can a leopard really change its
well-defined identifying antiquated
intricated spots for unicoated uniformly
single-coloured sully-free non-dots?
Love Should Be [poem/sonnet]
Love
[I mean the full real thing
not some bland and pale
embellishment
with little mutual
relishment or one
wherein there is no heat
or where blood runs
through cold blue veins
or where unequal
treatment reigns
or where somehow
with clanking chains
such fetters mean that
passion wanes or where
there is deceit and guile
so naïve hearts are
crudely wiled away
like wood is whittled
knifely deeply down
to pieces on the floor
so separately they lay
togetherness no more]
Love I say
should
be
1
l
o
n
g
orgasm
of
everything
[by which I mean that there can be no trace
of compromise in any words or deeds;
no turncoat treason acts of ‘about face’ —
its garden sown with flowers (pluck out the weeds).
Full truth transparent is my battlecry
against all dull concession trade-off pacts
with all the forces massed to sell the lie
which from our fervent destiny distracts.
For how can heights which we profess to know
become a less-than-blissful dream fulfilled?
To go to higher peaks will mean to grow
if on our frail foundation we will build.
I will not have my love served up lukewarm:
To ecstasy alone will I conform!
© 2011, Alan Morrison
Gymnasium [poem]
I’m not a gymnasium, she said,
as my body moved with litheness
round her icy rigid form
on that well-sprung soya bed;
her hoity-toity voiceness
making echoes in my head
(And then the bridge
between the wetness
withered down
in shock(ness)
as my brain sent
vibes of mourning to
my sorry little cock).
That Sacred Day [sonnet]
When in those haunted corridors you hide
wherein you try to make another plane
the quest for truth can glibly be denied
and only fantasy and guile then reign.
You cast around to hear approving sounds
while compliments are lavished on your name
and fawning strains from courtiers abound —
just slivers from your broken mirror’s frame.
But, darling, let me whisper in your ear:
You need not confirmation’s bogus show;
for all the love to fast remove your fear
is right here in this starstruck Romeo.
I wait with patience till that sacred day
when all pretence dissolves and fades away.
© 2011, Alan Morrison
Arcadian Streams [sonnet]
Will waterfalls of swell soon give me rest?
Or must I ever sink in lakes and streams
which run like blood that never coalesced
and flow from my red eyes’ Arcadian streams.
A swimmer’s arms I had — or so I thought —
until that deadly current washed my flesh;
and all my loving energies did thwart
when I was in its siren weeds enmeshed.
If only reaching hands would pull me clear
I’d fling myself up to those arms with fire.
We’d then be hurled into the stratosphere
evaporating seas with strong desire.
Although I yearn to drown in salty deeps
a dim and glimly hope from Lethe me keeps.
© 2011, Alan Morrison
The Law of Burdens [poem]
Every burden not picked up
at this stage on the road
if picked up later down the track
becomes a heavier load.
That’s a basic rule of life
which many do ignore;
and I myself have walked away
from weighty loads galore.
Tornness [sonnet]
Being apart is what tears us apart
and torn apart we spill ourselves to earth.
Kicking below on the ground broken hearts;
forgotten is the price that true love’s worth.
As ripped and shredded clothing flew around
disguises then emerged among the rags;
while masquerades which camouflage rebound
and in our hands were posies and white flags.
But even though that desolation reigned
for such brief time as our fool flesh allowed
continuance was never foreordained —
to tear us more we quickly disavowed.
If we will now abandon all our fears
the tornness of our love will heal through tears.
© 2011, Alan Morrison
Outsider [sonnet]
Some people are destined to be alone.
Like it or not they wander through the earth
as flotsam at sea — kings without a throne.
Naked they stay as on their day of birth.
Preordained as pilgrims of the planet;
gathering wisdom from wounds which won’t heal.
Writing their runes on great slabs of granite;
secrets of heart to the world they reveal.
Yet even though they walk a rough-hewn road
and have no shelter from life’s raging storms
a dignity of sorts will be bestowed
to comfort them to live outside all norms.
On mountaintops (despite their scene remote)
they keep their equilibrium afloat.
© 2011, Alan Morrison
The Naked Troubadour 