scarecrow poetics/essays

Blood (1).

Fresh red blood
Dries on Gravesend’s streets
With veins so full
And over-worked
This is
No surprise.

Its wounds are
Sutured
Fixed-up
Tied together
With String.


Dad.

Your fingers on my face
Rough from work
And rubbed with tobacco
Huge and protective
Offering safety.

Now my fingers
On my face
Just like yours
Rough from work
Rubbed with tobacco.


Blood (2).

There’s blood on
The toilet seat
Like pillow talk
On Parrock Street
Like Spanish voices
Or Spanish fly
Like the opium dens
In Limehouse
Underground monoliths
Standing
Decadent
In their historical achievements.


My Chest is like a Rorschach Test.

My chest is
Like
A Rorschach test

Red butterflies
Skim
The epidermis.


Sleeping in an empty bed is still like sleeping with
you.

Sleeping in an
Empty bed is like
Sleeping with you

Tugging the bed
Covers and losing
The fight to rest

More so when yr
Out away from home
Ecstasy high

For you I write
Stanzas unfounded
Beholding I

For you I lie
Bic biro black
Ink dry and fucked.


Liberare.

This is my Cuba
The balcony
My veranda
Overlooking the brown rooftops
Grey houses and
Tarmac lakes.

Playing
Screaming
Fighting
The kids are my ocean waves
Crashing against the cars
And electricity.

Our revolution
Will never come
Through words.


Post-Illumination.

You’re not alone
Right Now
There’s not a single book
I want to read
Or a single song I
I want to sing
I just want to sit
On my doorstep
Smoking cigarettes
While the pseudo-spring wind
Blows swiftly
Across my naked feet
While dogs bark
In dark back gardens
While the dead
Move in
And out
Of porches and doors
And out
Goes the light across the court.


Johnny Grace © 2006.

Johnny Grace writes poetry and short fiction. He lives in Gravesend.