Category: Poems

Perform the Peacock Dance of the Dai People at an International Cultural Festival in the United States of America When pleasure is greatest, sorrow follows.XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX— Tu Fu On seeing her perform I thought:So this is why god made women!Why men who don’t know how to be menWant to but can never be them;Why we, unsexed, … Continue reading On Seeing a Chinese Student

For here, where hope is in the future, The present doesn’t haunt the day With the authenticity of a past In which every bullet-pocked wall Is preserved under bullet-proof glass In Berlin’s New Museum And the copper piping left exposed In London’s warehouse conversions And the wooden floor uncarpeted In New York’s loft apartments. For … Continue reading The Ghost of Authenticity

What words should I use to describe the heather That grew on St. David’s Head this summer? Magenta and mauve, maroon and violet, Fuchsia, indigo, lavender and lilac. And the green of his halo of fern and grass The yellow chaplet of ragwort and gorse. But, oh, the purples of St. David’s heather Will bloom … Continue reading St. David’s Head

Film finished, I raise the shutter by my seat Seven-and-a-half hours out of Hong Kong And peer out, blinking through the dazzling light Onto the sun-lit brilliance below. My eyes Adjust to a landscape formed a million years ago Or maybe only ten: vast fractals of cream Flowing between banks of dried-up streams That once … Continue reading Over Kazakhstan

This prospect that between my eyelids seeps Grabs at my dry thoughts, seizes my heartbeat, Enters that place where my soul is waiting Pulls me, like a hare through a noose in the woods, From knotted undergrowth to baize of grass Into its green heaven. And this is where I want to stay, today, tomorrow … Continue reading In Green Heaven

Beneath the barred windows of a work-unit XXXXXXXXin which the tenants were born and still live, Parakeets screech and preen their bright feathers XXXXXXXXfor a maiden flight they will never make, Cats nap through the heat of the summer’s day XXXXXXXXof the night in which they will never prowl, Dogs devour discarded meat from their … Continue reading The Jinxing Bird and Flower Market

The jacket was hi-vis, unnatural yellow,The shoes were trainers, her trousers I forget,But the broom with which she swept the country roadWas made of twigs tied to a branch for a handleAnd so looked like the tree from which it was made.But the cone of her hat, woven from bamboo,Was an unchanged three-thousand-year-old modelPerfect in … Continue reading Under Heaven

The ‘board’ is the instrument, not the method. — Christopher Hitchens ‘Believe Me, It’s Torture’ (2008) And then went down to the minivan, Set wheels to road, forth on the ungodly way, and We bore packed lunches aboard, our wearied ears Stopped with fingers against siren C-pop Piped amidships through singing speakers In the rosy-fingered … Continue reading Tourist-boarding

As British administration ends, we are, I believe, entitled to say that our own nation’s contribution here was to provide the scaffolding that enabled the people of Hong Kong to ascend. — Chris Patten, ‘Hong Kong Handover Ceremony Address’ (1997) On this dormant volcano’s side, ceaselessly Erupting roads and towers, last night’s food, This morning’s … Continue reading Western Garrison

‘And have you settled in?’ Thank you, Yes. Barely seen a cop at all. The food’s the best I’ve ever had, The women the most beautiful, And the city the most faithful To Alice Through the Looking Glass It’s ever been my joy to pass. One day I saw, in Chai Wan Park, An orgy … Continue reading Settling In