The Triumph of the Left Hemisphere
(i)
cobwebbed her face spun the spell of lechery a garden of forked paths
day and night tremble on the morning and evening star
morning brings the gull’s squall surreal beyond the curtained windows
the trees are ivy clad in a laurel bay like ship mast & rigging sunk
to the bottom of the sea
a filament of silver stabs the heart a slumbering breast cloud
blooded in night’s music on no breath of breeze
& flesh on flame trembles beneath naked branches
churlish fetching as though milk maids were wenching
like little red riding hoods
nor no kiss can seal our wound to heal not her him, him her not I nor mine
Godlike creation must be seen as producing monsters
in the gilt mirror of crooked butterflies where paper boats float with gondeliers
beneath its arches and children drown in innocence of the first reflected face
new ice age melts into soft ultra violet great maws devouring fleece
ascend the statues of the sky towards melting blue
a sky in chains Atlantic winds mast banners
wave musk of weed overgrown graves
paper castles on glass tables doll house tombs golden curls & dimples
from ghost houses screams the jackal down the long white hall
down the long white mall city of bleach close to the wind's white corners
ballerina in a champagne glass cherry lips sparkling eyes golden hair
delicate toes in bubbling foam until the last sips disappear in ripples
a pink & white cloud mattress washed to pillows of bleached stone
crepe clouds plume a three cornered hat pistols bloom back roses
The Triumph of the Left Hemisphere
(ii)
the first line on the page thought to escape its life sentence
like an errant angel falling into the breach
a heavenly ape descended & disappeared into the waters
transfixed the statue wears the same mask as the crowd transfixed
heaven & hell are on the spin of a coin
blue whales' melodies turned to shrieks are the ocean's voice
& the iceman cometh to explain the glory of a name by which he would be forgotten
write thin rice words to the roll of rice drums give alms to blindness
papyrus on a brain stem in a ventilation shaft
rivers of red ink we scratch fears of the trembling vertebrate
the long field shrew fleeing the hill to frozen waste
rice burning the paper sky small bones in the stubble frail nib at the edge
forlorn the streets we drift we drift on waste on waste no fiesta for the poet
no poem for the feast walk down walk down the western lane take heed
the locusts come take heed the rice fields are burning on west on west
as string tautens bow stretches arrow pivots arcs the long day crane
drops its breaking neck everyone imprisons in the telescope
a bleached pine branch floats its sodden joint wrenched
first came fresh in sweet pods & green mush splitting on
black lips black omnipotent tongue heart’s red blood trickling to feed
gorilla sky rains cockroaches singing in the rain all the milk white spilt heaven
coquette ruffles & coiffed wigette wrought in cream meringue ostrich plumes
& the newsman comes on measure of all things who rose from the glaciers
first dialectician of interlocution to a third person in hypothetical
argumentation of an imaginary plot fallen man in a museum in narrow straights
in the gallery on the knoll moulds without holds different helmets in the battle
black out at the shoot out banquets in display of poison bouquets
thaws to time's articulated perception a line with no other representation
but its manifold variation the mirror is all fur through trees convoluted
branches whose littered scales spangle down wind their voices
The Triumph of the Left Hemisphere
(iii)
mother of god in the death pen she's dancing on a string
a marionette at the gallows she sings as she swings one big world
yes on everbody’s lips her mouth stains the mirror with a kiss
after the eightfold city of light the morning hymn on high
where the dragon fly pays homage to the lotus to fame with Mozart
in another room from another room with another name on the radio made in china
drift like a broken antler in the soft silt quick on the swivel still unslacking
raging silent till torn aloft close your eyes
on your borders for now it’s safe to dream
& awake from a parallel dream of unknown separation where you reach out before
bandaged banisters spiral as a monstrous thorax throttled on each gargantuan
gargoyle floor a white electric cell stormed in the head of a whale that flounders
crashes onto the street of harlot shouts to become a reed at dawn
kept by the river of day & night kept by the sea in a window
where the raven shrieks dressed like a black flamenco
& every one spills in the shapeless sky
shedding rags in pirouettes
dark shards piercing the sunset in proportion to gravitation
yet they whispered she knew not she only her beloved called on lonely raven ridges
still her icy wails flail on bitter winds not freedom from your rags
raised to riches by the coolies amongst those dark satanic mills
a shadow slithers crankily down funicular stairs onto trap door landings
& narrow long doors through high thin halls like a crooked shank pin
out in black satin gold buckles on
Nantacas seven seas Rip Van Winkle’s
away to hoods on the wharves manacled bicycles in interminable rows
implore the shore’s deserted canals a town’s tier walls stained in moss fungi
lichen grime belies their fragrance drain pipes in rainwild weed corners
dandelion leaf red bramble in black warts rain runs as blood into shadows
its speechless phantoms amazed after so long still misunderstood
in shadowy strands thin bands like the oneness of ant waves or piranhas
long gone dance in the womb of incubation a well of gravity that spawns the ocean’s
unleashed shoal still trembling from the deeps where you hover in suspense
Robin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times ; at Artvilla.com his publications include
All the Babble of the Souk , Cartoon Molecules and Next Arrivals, collected poems, & Moon selected Audio Textual Poems available at Amazon.com as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande´s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist and the recently published Tesserae , a translation of Carmen Crespo´s Teselas.
You may visit Aquillrelle.com/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)