(3 poems)
by Jennifer Rees
of dead men and elephants
tags: elephants; death; marguerite poland; shades
down down
in the deepest of
hollows
lies a figure
poland’s crispin
could see
in ground-clouds
a leather elephant
that takes leave
of its descendants
and leathery men
whose quiet goodbyes
signal passing
the body
d
r
o t
p
shoulder first s
then elbow u
into the d
spine
buttocks
levering legs
follow
curl
and furl
into the dust-burrow
of dead men
and elephants
in all (fair)ness
where fumy paint adorns
freshly acknowledged shells
trending on twitter
loving the glitter
(until the next big thing)
but lady justice is
waiting
for more rape
more village-pillage
of already-ruins
or to age gracefully
on slow-to-die walls
to be loved in lenses
and/or
words
to say:
here lies lady justice
amongst wire
stones and
city-shit
to be looked upon
(like danté retching out words)
on his blindness
in her blindness
in all (fair)ness
(struck by this lady-on-a-wall in the heart of cape town and decided to get lost so we’d have to drive down the same road again.)
trop de bruit
(don’t ask. i don’t know.)
i can never
quite fathom
why the french
must say
“too much of noise”
as if the voluminous echoes
from radio and street
are a cake
to halve
quarter
slice up to share
as if ambulance
honking
shouting
and bonking
were hallowed slices
of black-forest gateau
of sponge
of chocolate
and sugary snow
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