Simon Smith
POST-POLITICAL LOVE POEM
return of the World
footprints in the snow
across opened ground
stared out by the stars & the next question
year by year by year
yeah yeah yeah
the atrocities wear on
like weather
noise filled with noise
war in the sense
in the senses
& everywhere being broken
the correspondences the conversations
next question is next
raise the voice into space
all ozone
up up skylark
to the dark-edged heart
& the blue-black rain
& all the rest
blue-black
posthumous
witness
winter after
the word is late
the work is late
a broad day glows
with dead battles
& the wail of exiles
the something which truth once was
to the late World
the abode
witness
the looking hoping for a sign
under fire exhale & translate darkness
cloud thinning
noise filling air
threadbare as reportage
the holes the spaces
the poem Being
the field of living
turned open
images in hearing
its afterlife
an occasion as snow dissolves
this takes place in the senses
this takes the place of senses
& snow-blindness
posts or stations
some signs of activity radiant
articulations
in the sense in the senses
burns the mouth splitting at the seams
the republic awake to thunder
hazard & risk
& the living hand-in-hand with the dead
& the yet to live
this weather front this pathfinder
a step closer
the colour grey gives courage gives orange
& words bleed the look faded
the gone acoustic
the dream past stars
light left behind
ELEGY: ON THE END OF ENDING
(for John James)
in gorgeous sky the church tower flowers with its corrugated roof
happiness like a charm of goldfinches pecking at warm tarmac
& no worries no blue where the air tastes clean
an open draft
they flit between
tangle
of long grass & brambles
in the uplift
the news like reading Hölderlin in the rain
turn into the bleak freezing air
or a silent walk mute & glazed
a long period of days
imminent immanence
keeping up keeping close to sunrise
rising on a cusp & never dies
attending as every bystander or interested party
on the tip of understanding
some sense makes no sense of the senses
when the words are holes
hesitant in the trick of it
the buzz in the ears endless reminder of the Infinite
in line & tone
a transport in the air unmoving
& way forward
full circle
autumn winter spring summer
o a beautiful country
full of the ugly
full of circuses & the right
breed of sentimentality
illusion full
to disappear to
a receding view
around the edges words shut off
fragment & fragment
for a tattered flag bleached white
& a swan’s song
the lesson & the kiss after the next breath dwell
shown in building work lintel
doorway & leap
whisked by train to town
on the track of naming
the ground
digging back & back
further back
& further around
in the duration of the day shadow of the stars
‘& your book resonant of a life’
enters the bloodstream clears the head & throat
deferred undecided
the closed not ended
FAIRGROUND
above tilted wave
one blue against ozone
the men on stilts
beyond the caravan park
sand & stars structure a totality of moments
above the tent
& mesh
or message in the inference
or off the deep & await the gods’ return
among scots pine clearing
the edge of dream &
space
brick wall
all this mystery
& rough ground
circuses & tilt of wave
in a row
harlequin in black & white
tumble through air
seagull passing in forgetting
days turn
to data & the wind
the viewfinder finds insignificance
through gravel grass clumps
water’s reflection up the seawall like flame
like rose
float up into “so there you are”
& “so who are you?”
to the north star
the net of the lyric in a pin of light
magicians shatter meaning into meanings
or how to read a forest
or a first view
like end of care tuned to a pneumatic drill
& the interference of the world
the open-ended left
over the immanent coming over
into clarity
refraction of view
saltimbanques charming the animals to life
agile awake all daylight
correspond to seeping half-lit
into the path of shadows
& all the names missing
is to say something beside unfamiliar
& risk catastrophe
immanent in the process of constellation
sound
disappears as a pin of light
a hooded unknown
dreams disintegrating
echo receded
money in the meter
half-lit following pattern
between cracks
in shadow
stars embedded in air
what Orpheus didn’t tell
the birds taught the poets to sing
correspondence
is a mere sign
saying goodbye
left as relics
between a galaxy or cell
at the tip of the horizon
the ocean at the end of the road
EMERGENCY ATTENTION
is lyric flowered into realignment
without content
like a leaf’s wing
the self edge
the record straight
a mouth touched by a moth
the full call
pull away the netting
pull away the haze
the stranger in your face
even through a veil
the Truth is blue broad
daylight azure through
ultramarine
through gauze
word without heart without
it cannot say it
with a wish lapse & cell
centrifuge & definition
recalls all forgotten thought
not quite quit
kite fanned tail feathers
silent dips & holds the air
above the glaze
reconnection of nowhere
above rooftops fields left
to fallow
to right its shadow free
form its eclipse
elapse erase
crystals of sand one answer
blown far
you see yourself
other bodied other
in a borrowed light the breach flowers
alien shadow stranger
transfers illegible & nowhere left
collapsed no refuge now here
none no-one to wander in mind of
the envelope of light
the envelope of presence
to midnight right there
in earshot on twigs hedge sparrow
the veil quiet
to sing to live “live”
turns the coins to good
not simple work
life & death
turn breath
picture by picture by picture
window after window after window
time captured
the cold cold enough for snow
in its shadow wounds opened
wonder sung out
& wrung
believe the World the flowering mouth
an impossible levitation
return of the World
footprints in the snow
across opened ground
stared out by the stars & the next question
year by year by year
yeah yeah yeah
the atrocities wear on
like weather
noise filled with noise
war in the sense
in the senses
& everywhere being broken
the correspondences the conversations
next question is next
raise the voice into space
all ozone
up up skylark
to the dark-edged heart
& the blue-black rain
& all the rest
blue-black
posthumous
witness
winter after
the word is late
the work is late
a broad day glows
with dead battles
& the wail of exiles
the something which truth once was
to the late World
the abode
witness
the looking hoping for a sign
under fire exhale & translate darkness
cloud thinning
noise filling air
threadbare as reportage
the holes the spaces
the poem Being
the field of living
turned open
images in hearing
its afterlife
an occasion as snow dissolves
this takes place in the senses
this takes the place of senses
& snow-blindness
posts or stations
some signs of activity radiant
articulations
in the sense in the senses
burns the mouth splitting at the seams
the republic awake to thunder
hazard & risk
& the living hand-in-hand with the dead
& the yet to live
this weather front this pathfinder
a step closer
the colour grey gives courage gives orange
& words bleed the look faded
the gone acoustic
the dream past stars
light left behind
ELEGY: ON THE END OF ENDING
(for John James)
in gorgeous sky the church tower flowers with its corrugated roof
happiness like a charm of goldfinches pecking at warm tarmac
& no worries no blue where the air tastes clean
an open draft
they flit between
tangle
of long grass & brambles
in the uplift
the news like reading Hölderlin in the rain
turn into the bleak freezing air
or a silent walk mute & glazed
a long period of days
imminent immanence
keeping up keeping close to sunrise
rising on a cusp & never dies
attending as every bystander or interested party
on the tip of understanding
some sense makes no sense of the senses
when the words are holes
hesitant in the trick of it
the buzz in the ears endless reminder of the Infinite
in line & tone
a transport in the air unmoving
& way forward
full circle
autumn winter spring summer
o a beautiful country
full of the ugly
full of circuses & the right
breed of sentimentality
illusion full
to disappear to
a receding view
around the edges words shut off
fragment & fragment
for a tattered flag bleached white
& a swan’s song
the lesson & the kiss after the next breath dwell
shown in building work lintel
doorway & leap
whisked by train to town
on the track of naming
the ground
digging back & back
further back
& further around
in the duration of the day shadow of the stars
‘& your book resonant of a life’
enters the bloodstream clears the head & throat
deferred undecided
the closed not ended
FAIRGROUND
above tilted wave
one blue against ozone
the men on stilts
beyond the caravan park
sand & stars structure a totality of moments
above the tent
& mesh
or message in the inference
or off the deep & await the gods’ return
among scots pine clearing
the edge of dream &
space
brick wall
all this mystery
& rough ground
circuses & tilt of wave
in a row
harlequin in black & white
tumble through air
seagull passing in forgetting
days turn
to data & the wind
the viewfinder finds insignificance
through gravel grass clumps
water’s reflection up the seawall like flame
like rose
float up into “so there you are”
& “so who are you?”
to the north star
the net of the lyric in a pin of light
magicians shatter meaning into meanings
or how to read a forest
or a first view
like end of care tuned to a pneumatic drill
& the interference of the world
the open-ended left
over the immanent coming over
into clarity
refraction of view
saltimbanques charming the animals to life
agile awake all daylight
correspond to seeping half-lit
into the path of shadows
& all the names missing
is to say something beside unfamiliar
& risk catastrophe
immanent in the process of constellation
sound
disappears as a pin of light
a hooded unknown
dreams disintegrating
echo receded
money in the meter
half-lit following pattern
between cracks
in shadow
stars embedded in air
what Orpheus didn’t tell
the birds taught the poets to sing
correspondence
is a mere sign
saying goodbye
left as relics
between a galaxy or cell
at the tip of the horizon
the ocean at the end of the road
EMERGENCY ATTENTION
is lyric flowered into realignment
without content
like a leaf’s wing
the self edge
the record straight
a mouth touched by a moth
the full call
pull away the netting
pull away the haze
the stranger in your face
even through a veil
the Truth is blue broad
daylight azure through
ultramarine
through gauze
word without heart without
it cannot say it
with a wish lapse & cell
centrifuge & definition
recalls all forgotten thought
not quite quit
kite fanned tail feathers
silent dips & holds the air
above the glaze
reconnection of nowhere
above rooftops fields left
to fallow
to right its shadow free
form its eclipse
elapse erase
crystals of sand one answer
blown far
you see yourself
other bodied other
in a borrowed light the breach flowers
alien shadow stranger
transfers illegible & nowhere left
collapsed no refuge now here
none no-one to wander in mind of
the envelope of light
the envelope of presence
to midnight right there
in earshot on twigs hedge sparrow
the veil quiet
to sing to live “live”
turns the coins to good
not simple work
life & death
turn breath
picture by picture by picture
window after window after window
time captured
the cold cold enough for snow
in its shadow wounds opened
wonder sung out
& wrung
believe the World the flowering mouth
an impossible levitation
© Copyright Simon Smith 2020
Simon Smith’s selected poems, More Flowers Than You Could Possibly Carry, appeared from Shearsman Books in 2016. 2018 saw the publication of three books, some Municipal Love Poems (Muscaliet), Day In, Day Out (Parlor Press), and The Books of Catullus (Carcanet). In January 2020 he took part in the ‘In Our Time’ programme on Catullus, broadcast on BBC Radio 4. He is reader in creative writing at the University of Kent, was a Hawthornden Writing Fellow in 2009, and a judge of the National Poetry Prize in 2004. This is his sixth appearance in Molly Bloom.
