i went to the matisse cut-outs
saw plain my soul need :
explode colour with colour
shunt word against word
make bombs

there’s something in me which says
fuck peace :
let’s make fireworks

i’ve changed my mind
decided after all
i don’t want to sit peaceful for a thousand years
stories life all passing through
so many clouds on empty air
i want to get my hands dirty
all the way up my arms
and then i want to flounder
day and all the night
in thick mud of my own creation
i want to get shocking filthy
deep down dirty
in everything it means to be alive

marquee of stone squats vast as pyramids
each granite arch yawns wider
no sun no warmth may enter
who owns this space ?
not god not me not the priest here
not the devoted who file through each day
ants moving over granite to kiss a picture
a pair of pigeons made black by the stone
flaps across the gaping void
wings inside this place shocking loud
they sit high up in the great dome
at home and chattering in places beyond our reach
lords here:
the meek have inherited

past sits heavy on these shoulders
leeches from the fabric of the coats
makes heavy weather on the pedestrian precinct
yet in amongst the old burns the new:
it’s in the surge of the puppy on its lead
in the flurries of the seed head swirling up
as though earth isn’t the only place
it’s in the child who offers the wink
so slow so deliberate that it’s clear:
things are not what they seem
and in no way are things what they seem:

it’s going to happen any minute
altogether now and on the count of three:
everyone unzips their anorak
throws off the past:
it’s a dance routine they’ve been working on
the whole of the past century.

the girl said
where you live you not have ownerless-dog ?
no I said expecting congratulation
on the super-efficient ownerless-dog-free land from which I come
her face turned fretful
to the open window which gaped on the street
sad she said, so sad
we loves the dogs
and the dogs loves us
i turned to where she looked
out over her city of dogs
soaring and lolling and fat in the sun
doing the good work of getting loved
receiving and receiving
in a place which has known loss
over and forever

i went to church today
and i asked jesus if i could be like him
show me i said
the way
he laughed and said
sweet thing
i showed you that already
i said
(aware of the iron hot in which i was)
is there any way you could could be minded to put me in the way of it ?
he said
you are that
i said if that’s true
how come I feel so fucking lonely ?
and he said
sweet thing
you think I didn’t ?