The Geranium Hotel Poems

Before age has sulked upon my brow And youth is still wet upon my nape I intend to search out the library ideal The secret understanding of gentlemen- able Where knowledge is lord Poetry is king and words are pathways Down orchards and groves Through blossomed learnings Under knotted branches of aesthetic leanings The smell of alcohol mixed with leather Of dust and books and lusty looks Surrounded by a lifetime of collecting lives Upon old sofas with knees and minds touching Laughter being born and dying together This Library ideal, that welcome distraction From all things that matter less A place where horizons are reached And logic pauses to be reformed Where a soft kiss can mean more than Alexandria's fire And a sweet embrace wipes blank every page Within every book

I awoke pupils wide and grip tight Enough words on my mind Central to the vision of fantasy’s reach You, me, crevice and down This is the belief in the poet’s morning fiction Can love’s curve sharpen to a point? Draw tight and tingle at the touch? What are you God of? Who leaves you white salutations at the coming of the day? With blank paper muscles fleeced with hair Can I believe in you? I awoke tangled up in landscapes of darkness Pulled apart and ready to devour Tasted with the tongue of youth And flesh grabbed at with fingers of pleasure Pupils wide and grip tight I heard a music A music of distant confusion Not terrifying, no, though it was unsettling As though someone had finally sharpened love’s curve And surrendering what we had fought for To the ocean’s gravely floor Where no poet can offer a compassionate funeral For the idea of you, me, crevice and down So I awoke Here in a room with a window and watercolour My pupils wide, my grip tight The taste of salt upon my lips A

Take the thunder’s roll from the hand And feed it to the memory of your youth Frame what thoughts you must And paste paper over any history you like ------------- OH SWEET CUM! ------------- Isn’t this the summer that you will die? Isn’t this the January in which the crown is mine? Isn’t this the morning that you shake hands With a man called Whitman What dream did you design for him? You, the engineer of oily fantasy Isn’t this the hour of the wild 80’s leather beast? Isn’t this the time of the Rimbaud profiteer? Ha! Sweet profiteer ------------- OH SWEET CUM! ------------- O, sweet summer, you who will chase the fields and streams You who will caress willow leaf and wetted limb Drying naked flesh, wilting springs glowing flower Spring, like yesterday we do not care for Only you, sweet summer, who slowly meanders along the road, smiling at the boys and shining on their beauty ------------- OH SWEET CUM! ------------- The movie it ends The poem it never does, it intrigues me And it s

Grabbing at the claimed land that is your mind The nerves at the tips of my fingers senseless The skin hardened with the crawling to your feet Over the world that I conquered And I wept for there was one more to conquer Yours The Claimed land that is you mind My lips meeting yours like two naval fleets and in between them, two sea monsters Thrashing, sensual and terrifying hard against one another Our eyes blinded by the golden fringed darkness Our inner-vision blurred by the black-bordered lust (like funeral paper, heavy, foggy, madness invoking) We feel around for one another's weak points For the strongest standing point And we decide what it is we can afford to lose and wish to gain All I want is the claimed land that is your mind It holds something that I want And I have conquered all to come to you Come to conquer the pride that has claimed it So I can free the fog And wash clean the remnants And after the battle I will sacrifice to eros The heavenly l

Constantine Cavafy, I've been reading of your life It is one that sprouts the seeds of curiosity within me You had many friends and lovers And no children Your words were your sons These are my sons Like yours Apparently though, I will never fully understand For I do not know the Greek language The translation is a glass of wine That while makes my head light and full of bliss Still veils the path that you want me to walk I know what it is you say Yet how you say it, your incantations, remain aloof Your magic spells They made a museum for you, you know? In the Alexandrian apartment you lived in Perhaps I will visit it one day When I go to find the library's foundations And Alexander's resting place Or should I spend the spring (for it is on its way) Trying to learn Greek? Oh what a chore! Love always seems to be But, ultimately it seems worth it Maybe you would be the cure for my soul? Did you know They say your most important work was done after