Poem: 'COUNTING BYZANTINE PEPPER BUSHES WITH THE CHRONIC ARGONAUTS'

COUNTING BYZANTINE 

PEPPER BUSHES WITH 

 THE CHRONIC ARGONAUTS / 

TIME-CROSSED LOVERS 

RAVING AT THE MOON 

we meet between
the Time Towers
on nodes of the
worm cycle

speak erotic blasphemy while
terrorists and lovers
speak only confusion

to you, I’m
Danny Darkness,
to me, your
raster eyes
irradiate
eternity

we trip a storm
of crimson wings
noisy with birdsong
to a vaporising city
where altitude beams
pulse in resonating
echo

then dematerialize
through places that shine
until we grow weightless
to observe sunspots
and solar flares

lights drift like
tethered nebulae here
and mournful hyenas
eat the faces from
sleeping men

I ride the time worm cycle
from enrichment to nullity,
as this Danny Darkness hunts
the riddles of your face

I’m woken by air-attack banshees,
by the ripple of pterodactyls,
by a male voice choir, and
sometimes by the homely
assonance of steam train
whistles that drift up
from Cairo’s main
rail terminal

we met between
the Time Towers
across nodes of
the worm cycle when
worlds drifted through
spatial zones of temporal
non-causality, energising
bounces across ages from
Earth’s slow end lit by
red uncertain sunlight

then back here, to
Cretaceous beaches

and us
time-crossed lovers
raving at strange
primeval
moons


Published in:
‘STOP GAP!’ edit Pete Presford (Spring/Jan 1997 – UK)
‘HANDSHAKE/ Dunnock Press no.25’ (July 1997 – UK)
‘FOCUS no.32 (Nov/Dec)’ (February 1998 – UK)
and in the collection:
‘EUROSHIMA MON AMOUR’ Hilltop Press (UK-Oct 2000)