A CHRISTMAS POEM

my love is ox hide in silk stockings

nicknamed Havoc for always asking

to be laid waste, played havoc with

a sweet young drama-trauma queen

always smoking perique with hashish

going flashing naked in his mackintosh

landed in the hoosgow Christmas Eve

WORD FOR WORD

ONCE UPON A TIME

there was a burial mound

of living words left unsaid

in the dark pressed under

and wrapped up tight as a

mummy in a straight-jacket

heaped together in a pile

to end all piles constricted

concentrating without space

and swelling till released

by a big breath out of God

it exploded in a bombast

unraveling and scattering

revelations sprinkling starry

inklings of words speaking

stretching far and farther

out to begin the beginning

where there is space and

light while God breathes in

ONCE UPON A TIME