Verse X

You wrote rot, wrought

Rapid wretchedness after

This line, that line, broken

Where X-

Pens tickle, no, tackle your confidence

Words throttle your throat

On behalf.

Verse Y

You read dread, fought

Footmarks to the next idea

This thought, that thought, undressed

Where X-

Tent, yes, intent

Signs arrest, if

Verse Z

You lived lost, sub-

Versions of an unfinished poem

This form, that content, reincarnating failed theories

Where X-

Changes of intellectual goods invest, no, divest

The tyranny of practice, brilliant controversies

Living the last canon.

The City

The city squeezed up, boiling

The city running

Then stretched out like a samurai ready to die

Gang-for-gang, and days of endless nights

The city crawling now

Vomiting its many

Colours

Sounds

Odours

The city reaching out

Lustily

Wanting to caress the sky

The city in the city

Rising falling rising…

desperately

new-yorking

parising

londoning

The city full because empty

the city of the day, its veins in vain

the city of the night, its arteries at risk

and the running chaos

the city never sitting idle

beside a new idea

Museum Piece

Skin of water, thriving

Will find us here

Plastered on wood, where

Solitude welcomes

There

Is no speech in the abyss,

Empty dross touring, there.

A poem rises, surprised

At a reading misread.

Skin of fire too

Will find no finds

Like murdertongues.

My Work Desk

(Changing Guards)

Arranged

Disarranged

            Re-

Arranged, ranged

De-

Ranged

            Oh, en-

Raged

That each affix of work lies

                        on top of

                        in front of

                        beside

                        in-between

                        behind

            can’t find what where

Everywhere a life of dis-

                                    order &

            s

                        c

a

            tt          n          g

er

i

Wryting this badly written poem

Peacework

let's declare peace & conscript every poet's script
let's wage silence against insolence
let's liberate poems from the tyranny of ideas

let’s let go

if the outlet can’t come

Spyder

Where to stand to watch the word

Hard to listen, easy to hear

Easy to see, so hard to recognize

The messenger in the message

Gated evenings for a eureka

And Passwords that dread to pass through the portal

The word so slippery,

Runs through the narrow space between now & then

Webs wanting the in-betweens

Where, to happen

Makes imagination travel

Light among shadows of experience

Copyright © Obododimma Oha, 2008

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