Poetry

Two poems

Anytime Before Byzantium

From the back deck I hear the swans cry

look up, and see them winging by.

Each of them contain two motifs:

The curlicue 2 when on the water

the eelneck & bodybulb when on the air.

That outstretched neck, the strange ungainly,

makes them a miracle polytemporal

as when I see them flying at night

with a moon of hammered gold behind

flying as if in oil paint in 1865

or on a cup embossed in 1265

or any time before Byzantium or through

the reed architecture of Iraq, or above

and beyond the eel-weirs of here.

The eyes transport – they are boats –

the ears inspire – they fill the lungs –

But if perchance you only see the gleam of

screens

this most natural yet tutelary of spirits

would seem as freakish as a normal baby born

or the real and everyday vanishment of death.

Art’s “surreal black swan” is obviously our

own doing

while the swan flying-on governs its own

presentation.

Grace then is when the palette of habitat

blends with our inner picture of its creatures.

The bird glides from sepia-wet, enters the ink

of dune-shadow

which in turn blends into incomparable night.

The swan is rubbed away but we know it is still

there

dreaming under the wing. It is our memory

that shines the star. Without it we are blank

And the night is never that.

Keep the swan in your heart, the workaday

of its paddling feet, the glamour of its buoyant

glide.

This is the inclusiveness of swan, the

classlessness of brackish light

the ethics of how we are more than one.

Listen, through life’s mindless tunes until

you know its voice like a wild relative.

Then, on the back deck, in yon auditorium of

estuary

or on the pavement grey, smile.

But take no direction from me

nor any other baton of the historical score,

go out under your own dream-wing

swim the river beyond time to find

the sound and texture of water.

carp

Ye being a common fifher with a bent for trophy and riverflefh take this Incorrigible Waterlord o the Brown Fathoms (alive if poffible), scovr him, and rvb him clean with Water and Salt, bvt scale him not, then open him, pvtting the Obdvrate Fox o the Streams, with blood and Prvffian liver (which Ye mvft saue when Ye open him, it being tangy still with Danvbian Songs) into a small pot or kettle; then take a migrant’s Thyme and Eternity, of each half an auenging knvcklefvl, a sprig of Conuict Rofemary, and another of Sporting Sauory, bind them into two or three coarfe bvndles, and pvt them to the Stvbborn Aquatik Squatter, with fovr or fiue whole Onions, twenty pickled Oyfters, and three Small bvt lnfvrgent Anchouies. Then povr vpon yovr Noxiovs Ariftocrat as mvch Claret Wine as will only couer him; and seafon yovr Claret well with Exotik Cloues o Enuironmental Regvlations, and the rinds of Oranges and Lemons (or whateuer other Frvits of the Landgrab are in yovr kitchen garden), couer yovr pot and set it on a qvick evcalyptvs fire, till it be boiled; then take ovt the Great Old Endvrer, this Manvfactvrer o Darknefs, Ovr Thickfkinned Sqvire o Tvrbidity, and simply lay it hvmbly with the broth into the difh, and povr vpon it a third of a povnd of Johnny-Come-Lately, properly gridded and beaten with a Nvtty & Paftoralifed Wrath, add half a dozen spoonfvls of Infra-red Svperiority, the yolks of two or three Brolga Eggs, with some of the Herbs and Ideas shred, garnifh yovr difh with more Federation Hypocrifies and Other Great Philofophies and so serue it vp.

This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on March 8, 2025 as "Two poems".

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