bodies

my own body
is the best body to be born into
i am a high caste man
i am reliably informed
by my astrologer
i have only one rebirth left

not all bodies are so
fortunate
for the soul

women's bodies of course
are not their own
ever
they are yours and mine
and any man
or priest
or teacher or boss
and husband and
a mother-in-law's too of course
(or daytime TV would die)

there are bodies
that wade in our shit
bodies that clean our streets
there are bodies
that slip unseen
making the lives of
bodies like mine
almost divine

of course my body is not so
fortunate
if i leave this country
brown bodies are pawns
targets
black bodies were
tools
now targets too

out there the white bodies
are the best bodies to be born into
how well they fit
how chic and flattering

so i may as well stay here
comfortable
perched on the bodies of women
and those unseen who
make my life
almost divine
and wait for my last life

why I oppose bans on burkas, burkinis and the hijab

One defence offered by officials in Nice and other cities that are imposing a burkini ban is that it is about allowing women to wear what they freely choose to, and not what is imposed on them. I am in agreement with the idea that we should all freely choose how to clothe and express ourselves. However, this ignores the many constraints we all labour under. 
My friends in IT and banking generally have to conform to a dress code at work - formal shirts and pants and shoes for the men, salwar kamees or saris for the women. There is some room for 'dressing down' in collar t-shirts or khakis especially on fridays, and a lot of people do seem to be able wear jeans fairly often, although usually not on a monday. In the advertising industry, it was clear who you were from your attire - creatives in jeans, tees, kurtas, account execs in formals, pre-press and production teams in cotton half-sleeved shirts, comfy trousers and chappals. In my own building, my Chinese neighbour and his wife generally wear smart casuals, as they're called, while the women in the Jain families wear saris with the pallu draped over their heads like hoods. 
Not all these choices are as visibly erasing of personal identity as the hijab, true. And not all of them come with the dire consequences that face a woman flouting hijab in a fundamentalist Islamic society. But try showing up to your monday morning team meeting in bermuda shorts and a hawaii shirt, or to your job as a teller in a tube top and mini skirt. There will be consequences. Heck, look at how colleges in this city police their students' attire, especially the female students. 
My point is that there is rarely any such thing as pure freedom of choice in what you wear. You are part of a society, a work culture, you have limitations that you can chose to follow or flout depending on your own level of privilege, daring or conversely your wish not to rock the boat or to respect certain norms. I personally don't understand respecting norms that restrict you, but I understand that it is a valid personal choice. However, choice is not the only factor determining your appearance. Often, it's safety and self preservation. 
Given all of this, given the fact that we already dedicate too much public energy to regulating or deregulating womens' appearance, maybe a truly liberty-loving attitude would be to let people wear what keeps them comfortable in their own skins. France is not where the Islamic attitude to hijab will be changed and French lawmakers are not the ones who will change it. Organisations like My Stealthy Freedom and the Iranian men who have taken to wearing the veil as a protest and a show of solidarity might. Debate, dissent and dialogue in Islamic societies will only be fixed further into entrenched defensive positions if a tradition is seen as under attack from 'the West'. In short, I can think of no way in which non-Islamic authorities banning Islamic religious attire is justified or helpful, even as I echo the Nice officials' belief that everyone should be allowed to determine what they wear.

some recent poems

1.

has anyone found a lost poem
at the intersection of inspiration
and perspiration
i think i left it there
last night while i was 
out flying over this city
hand in hand with 
some gloomy man
who spoke like Edgar Alan Poe
has anyone found a lost raven
at the intersection of predestination
and automation
i think i left it there
yesterday while i was swimming
fin in paw with
some porpoise that sang
like Leonard Cohen
like Ali Farka Toure
has anyone found a lost guitar
I think I left it at the intersection of syncopation
and desperation
last night while i was 
out flying these oceans
somewhere in a nocturne
with a child like Chopin
a child like Alma Mahler
i need all my poems
my ravens
my guitars
i need all my dreams back
or i'll not fly or swim or dive
tonight

2. 

Realism is murder 
Reality is death

3. 

we have decided to turn our backs
on the future, the past and the present
we have decided to close the book
on the third, the fifth and the ninth
on Beethoven, Bruckner and Mahler
we have decided to burn the bridges
to utopia, dystopia and wherever else
we have decided to turn a blind eye
to pain, to pleasure and to numbness
we have decided to draw a line
and scrawl finis
and you cannot follow us

4.

We could always settle for tea
Earl Grey? Darjeeling?
We could always settle for liberty 
Conditional? Imaginary?
We've settled for little enough 
We can always settle for nothing
We've settled like sediment
In the lees of our own cups
We could make do with a cup of wine
A book of poetry and One
I think I'll settle for tea for two, today
I think I'll settle for Darjeeling

i sometimes suspect
she is alive
in cyberspace
because i sometimes
sense a flutter of pixels
sometimes catch a glimpse
of a
corner of the screen
sprite
fluttering by
following her fish

what is a place 

or a home

i am not certain location

or masonry

is all of it

but i am not certain it isn’t

i felt the bricks call me

i felt the columns and porticos

subside softly

gladly

under my footsteps

i felt the old halls slink around me

like a dog at my ankles

and it’s all gone now

or soon enough

all gone in dust and rubble

and then something

something leaping up to the sky

something reaching out to the future

what is a place 

or a home

i am not certain it is anything more

than what you can store

in an inexorably dying brain

i cannot prove it is anything tangible

cannot prove it isn’t all an elaborate hoax

most things it seems to me

most fundamental things

can be shown to be false

imaginary

never were

never are

i think it is better that way

i think it is better it is all already gone

and we can hold our memories

reminisce columns and porticos

courtyards and statuary

and ask ourselves

what is a place

or a home

hellstreets and cityspell

I should just sleep 
On days like this
The city a huddle 
Of heat sinks
Of light radiating
Dark
The city a death 
Aimed at the lives
Within 
The sun a far cry
Screaming hell in the air 
I should sleep through 
Days like this 
Not mad dog it 
A noonday demon 
A dust devil 
Riding rays of dark light 
Each building a tomb
Each man and woman 
A corpse 
The streets all run into 
A sea of discord
The city a gun
Trained on itself 
Days like this 
I should not limp
Another broken man
Thin and lost 
Searching for nothing 
And to nothing returning 
Stuck in a nightmare 
Restless 
Awake 
The city a fist 
My face burned away 
The sun 
And the tombs 
And all 
The women and men 
Who are burned too 
Only our shadows 
And funerary portraits 
To show us 
Where we are
In this whiteout blackhole 
City hell city spell 
We are woven into 
And we should all 
Be asleep 
Until all of this 
Goes away 
Leaving only cobwebs 
Only dewy dawn 
Only quiet music 
And no light 
To drag us out 
Into hellstreets and cityspell

cruel as we are

hello cruel world

i came to you complicit

by my genes, my sex 

my birth not a neutral act

hello cruel world

i come to you in

Solidarity, I am your

Instrument of brutality

hello cruel world

i come to you complicit

by my guile, my connivance

my silence and my spirit

hello cruel world

i your noose and hangman

i your hangman’s knot

i come to you with blood

hello cruel world

on my hands the stains

of a life in your service

in service of my self

hello cruel world

cruel as you are

you must see it clear

you’ve taken your toll

hello cruel world

there comes a blunting

worn dull over time

i will fail you too

hello cruel world

i believe my race’s run

my trail of bodies

ends with my own

hello cruel world

i hang my head before you

you pull the switch on me

in torment i gladly die 

where the path passes the houses

what gladdens what quickens

what withers silently

while summer beckons

while silent winds gather

when evening comes

what chorus fades, echoes

what refrain pauses soft

when even dust settles

and in darkness is lost

what silence do they hear

what mirages what ashes

where pavilions were razed

who endures who prevails

when dusk invites confidences

what muted march resumes

where the path passes the houses

who listens, who endures
and how do they pay the price

11/1/16

At least Bob Calvert
Has some company now
Syd don't play no more
And Jimi only jams
With Jack Bruce

At least Bob Calvert
Has someone to trade
Couplets with
Until Moorcock hangs up his hat
And comes busking down to Tanelorn

Razorwire Days

These are sandpaper days

Scraping at my skin

These are razor rash days

These are papercut days

Small wounds accrete

Passing grievances club together

And fester, a sense of injustice

I can’t quite erase

These are camel back days

These are final straw days

Spinal contortions so long sustained

Now unravel in spray of vertebrae

Final days, days of uncoiling

These are razorwire days

These are icepick days

Silhouetted against deserts of time

These are looming days

Insignificant as they are

But fatal to me, tired as I am

By all the days before and after and this one