The first season of London Open Mic Poetry Night comes to a close on June 5th, 2013. David J. Paul will be the featured poet.
David has two chapbooks: Locomotive and Tender (Jamie Hamilton’s Pikadilly Press, 1977) and Spilling the Beans (Clarke Leverette’s Killaly Press, 1979). His one full-length book, Trapped Moonlight, was published in 2005 by Sheila Martindale and South Western Ontario Poetry.
On the fifth of June, David hopes to read more than a baker’s dozen’s worth of poems about dogs, birds, news events, writers and desire—a little Eros and Thanatos at Mykonos.
1. MORNINGS
David has two chapbooks: Locomotive and Tender (Jamie Hamilton’s Pikadilly Press, 1977) and Spilling the Beans (Clarke Leverette’s Killaly Press, 1979). His one full-length book, Trapped Moonlight, was published in 2005 by Sheila Martindale and South Western Ontario Poetry.
On the fifth of June, David hopes to read more than a baker’s dozen’s worth of poems about dogs, birds, news events, writers and desire—a little Eros and Thanatos at Mykonos.
1. MORNINGS
I walk the spider
down my shirt
and loop the snake
around my waist
and tie the butterflies
across my feet
to take the dog
for her morning walk.
© David J. Paul
2. SOMEONE WENT BEFORE
This long path
across the snow
a little wider
than two boots
side by side
was given me
as short-cut
and connection
by some unknown
whose first boots
plunged deep
into wells of snow
and whose legs
pulled out step
by step each foot
but in that
going slow
he’s sped up mine
and now the path’s
hard-packed
by all of us who
have approved
his slightly off
the compass
straight and true
this crooked gift
that soon will shrink
and disappear
in the sun’s heat
and the rain’s flow.
© David J. Paul
3. INSOMNIA
Lying in his bed
beside his wife
he’s wide awake
blinking at the dark
just an animal
breathing in and out
sucking on the air
a consciousness
who knows his light
will disappear
but the dark is great
and his place is small
his body a house
where he’s the tenant
and the landlord
how he understands
all he owns is breath
what can he do
but get on with it
and hope to suffer
wisdom on the way.
© David J. Paul
4. FIVE BIRDS AND A FENCE
five grey and brown house
sparrows weaving in and out
of a chain-link fence and
filling up the tilted squares
with their common lively bodies
clues of this and now
in a crossword strung across
the backside of a schoolyard
calling me with answers on
the slant not across and
down but this side that
side how many letters and
what’s a synonym for that
word and what’s it start
with oh induction and then
deduction what you know and
what you can subtract tic
tac toe we fly and
play for you who’s captured
by the curse to know
© David J. Paul
Trapped Moonlight (South Western Ontario Poetry, 2005)
down my shirt
and loop the snake
around my waist
and tie the butterflies
across my feet
to take the dog
for her morning walk.
© David J. Paul
2. SOMEONE WENT BEFORE
This long path
across the snow
a little wider
than two boots
side by side
was given me
as short-cut
and connection
by some unknown
whose first boots
plunged deep
into wells of snow
and whose legs
pulled out step
by step each foot
but in that
going slow
he’s sped up mine
and now the path’s
hard-packed
by all of us who
have approved
his slightly off
the compass
straight and true
this crooked gift
that soon will shrink
and disappear
in the sun’s heat
and the rain’s flow.
© David J. Paul
3. INSOMNIA
Lying in his bed
beside his wife
he’s wide awake
blinking at the dark
just an animal
breathing in and out
sucking on the air
a consciousness
who knows his light
will disappear
but the dark is great
and his place is small
his body a house
where he’s the tenant
and the landlord
how he understands
all he owns is breath
what can he do
but get on with it
and hope to suffer
wisdom on the way.
© David J. Paul
4. FIVE BIRDS AND A FENCE
five grey and brown house
sparrows weaving in and out
of a chain-link fence and
filling up the tilted squares
with their common lively bodies
clues of this and now
in a crossword strung across
the backside of a schoolyard
calling me with answers on
the slant not across and
down but this side that
side how many letters and
what’s a synonym for that
word and what’s it start
with oh induction and then
deduction what you know and
what you can subtract tic
tac toe we fly and
play for you who’s captured
by the curse to know
© David J. Paul
Trapped Moonlight (South Western Ontario Poetry, 2005)
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