Acquaintance

Don't try to seduce me blue vault
I'm not playing
You are the vault of the thirsty palate
Over my head

Ribbon of space
Don't wind round my legs
Don't try to entrance me
You are a wakeful tongue
A seven-forked tongue
Beneath my steps
I'm not coming

My ingenuous breathing
My breathless breathing
Don't try to intoxicate me
I sense the breath of the beast
I'm not playing

I hear the familiar clash of dogs
The clash of teeth on teeth
I feel the dark of the jaws
That opens my eyes
I see

I see
I'm not dreaming

Conversation

Why do you rear up
And desert the yender shores
Why O my blood

Where should I send you
To the sun

You think the sun kisses
You've no idea
My buried river

You're hurting me
Carrying away my sticks and stones
What ails you my whirligig

You'll spoil my infinite circle
That we haven't finished building yet
My red dragon

Only flow further
So the feet don't walk off with you
Flow as far as you can O my blood

The Iron Apple Tree

Where is my peace
Impenetrable peace

The iron apple tree
Has pierced my skull with its trunk
I gnaw at it
I have gnawed away my jaws

With its leaves it fettered me
I browse on them
I have browsed away my lips

With its branches it hobbled me
I try to break them
I have broken my fingers

Where is my peace
Unbreakable peace

The iron apple tree
Has sent down its roots
Deep into my soft rock
I pull at them
I have pulled out my entrails

With its cruel fruit it fattens me up
I bore into them
I have bored through my brain

Where is my peace
To be the iron apple tree's
First rust and last autumn

Where is where is my peace

Echo

The empty room begins to growl
I withdraw into my skin

The ceiling begins to yelp
I fling it a bone
The corners begin to yap
To each I fling a bone
The floor begins to bay
I fling it a bone too

One wall begins to bark
To it I fling a bone
And the second and third and fourth walls
Begin to bark
I fling each one a bone

The empty room begins to howl
And I myself empty
Without a single bone

Turn into a hundredfold
Echo of the howling

And echo echo
Echo

Departure

Pennington Hendry
I'm no longer here
I haven't moved from the spot
But I'm here now

Let them come in
Let them look let them search

The watermill in the shadow of the ribs
Grinds the ripe void
Fag ends of cheap dreams
Smoulder in the ashtray
I'm no longer here

A moored boat rocks
On the red waves
A few unripened words
Hang in the cloudy throat
I'm no longer here

I haven't moved from the spot
But I'm far away now
They'll scarcely catch me
I am no longer here
I have not moved from my chair
Yet I am there no longer
Let them come in
Look around and search

The mill in the shadow of my ribs
Grinds the ripe nothingness
Stubs of facile dreams
Smoke in the ashtray
I am there no longer

The anchored ship swings
On the red wave
Words still green
Tremble in the misty gorge
I am there no longer

I have not moved from my chair
And yet I am far away now
They will never get me

Journey

I journey
And the highway journeys too

The highway sighs
A deep dark sigh

I have no time for sighing
I journey further

No longer stumbling
Over sleeping stones on the highway
I journey lighter

No longer does the work-free wind
Delay me with chatter
It's as if he couldn't see me
I journey faster

My thoughts tell me I have left
Some bloody some dull pain
At the bottom of the abyss behind me

I have no time for thinking
I journey