Reply to Information

REPLY TO INFORMATION

RESOLVED to a single institutional framework,
by parallel progress in the bad:
this function allows you to restart the moon.

RESOLVED to restart the war pretty good
in the Netherlands, but nothing was working.
The guard watched him eat the chocolate cake.

DESIRING to create firm bases for some lime.
So mud sinks and before me
the grass does not grow stagnant.

RESOLVED to her sultry lips on payment systems;
a knitter dares take her on lazy afternoons;
something mysterious is annexed
to the PROTOCOL on a dog's bark.

Conference agrees that it is surely
an accidental coincidence.
Meeting in the back,
a DECLARATION on her wits is sung.

Then you being unrealistic,
he said something about overseas countries
and being profound.
We cannot find the gods!

© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Gee Cross, 4th October 1992

Publication

1993 Dial 174 (UK)

Lands End

               LANDS END

               The island cries
               Its tears are lost
               in the spray of the racing surf
               The rock hurts
               Pain penetrates each stratum
               The gas is low
               The kettle boils but slowly
               Cove and Cape concentrate the anger of rain
               Water persists in clouds
               In the morning of Good Friday
               the sun celebrates silence
               Early risers chew noisily
               on hot-cross-buns
               It is silly to talk of islands
               that do not cry
               or of rocks that feel no pain
               On the edge
               no man is untouched
               Behind all showers
               a rainbow hides

              © GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Sennen, 20th April 1985

Publications

1985 Pennine Platform (UK)
1986 FUTURES (Ipswich, Magic Pen Press)
1990 Spider Eyes (USA)
1993 Dial 174 (UK)
1999 Black Creek Review (USA)

Neighbours

NEIGHBOURS

Venusians, Martians, God - all now
discredited as Myth,
the electronic multi-million-dollar search
goes on for our nearest galactic neighbours.

A thousand upturned saucers scan
the radio emissions of the galaxies,
listening on a million wavelengths
for the wow of a signal that will say
- another sun's planet hosts intelligent life - .

If they be there,
a billion light years away,
could they now be here,
watching us ?

Perhaps it indeed were they
who spoilt the crops of those peasants
starved of food and money
halfway across this living Earth !

© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Ashton under Lyne, 3rd March 1981

Publications

1990 X-Calibre (UK)
1993 Sivullinen (Finland)
1994 Dial 174 (UK)

The Ice Is Frozen In Upon Itself

THE ICE IS FROZEN IN UPON ITSELF

The ice is frozen in upon itself
No amount of hyacinths
or pricking roses can melt
There is a hole in it from which blood pours
From the other opening
come waves in cut air
One of the holes is useless
sterile
essence of nothing
The ice is frozen in upon itself
Fire frightens it
sends into panic
Two ducts exude salt water
Shed skin withers
The ingathering of ethanolic drugs
is accentuation of accumulation
But even steady pressure
creates no heat
The ice is frozen in upon itself

© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Sheffield, 29th April 1973

Publications

1974 Littack (UK)
1980 THE RAINBOW AND OTHER POEMS (Heckmondwyke, Fighting Cock Press)
1993 Dial 174 (UK)
1993 Apostrophe (UK)

The Worst of Loneliness

THE WORST OF LONELINESS

Loneliness is not something that is difficult to bear
alone It's only when there is someone else who's there
and you know it's something that you cannot share
It's worse when you feel it in a kiss
Loneliness is not something that is hit or miss
The impulse is going off at a tangent
There are two of them They touch but don't impact
That's the hardest fact
the potency of a force that's merely impinging
never cutting through ice
or cracking that nice
but transparent facade that always fails to impress
Once you have it there's no escape It's all duress
Facing the wall won't relieve the stress
Loneliness alone is not so hard to bear
but it's all the worse to share
with an intimate caress

© Gerald England

Composed: Sheffield, 11th November 1971

1974 New Headland (UK)
1980 THE RAINBOW AND OTHER POEMS (Heckmondwyke, Fighting Cock Press)
1992 International Poetry (USA)
1993 Dial 174 (USA)