E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG

Christmas Prelude

Embrangling snow is forecast for Scotland
so it will come tomorrow, love:
verecund snow will bedizen
when asked out. Even now — look —
whiteness like the old walls of Hydra
(recall our honeymoon) descends.
This snow — trochal as a clock face
whose oval is an egg between the hands —
avoids time’s embracery, to move.
No need to miss colder Canada tonight:
new snow falls light as levin,
grows ever more candent. It drapes lace
across each feme sole's bed —
upon each winter bride a profluent dress.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM NINETEEN

The Ailment

What got there, got there
then it stayed. Like glue
a doctor implied. Like prayer
argued another clad like a father
black as grease. It stung
and stuck inside. A thorn

she cried; a hornet having died
the priest complained – unsin
thy side! It was presented
in a finding so I had to decide:
pull out the fervid pin or wasp
away to little else besides lather

on a shaved boy’s chin. Its clasp
was like wax on a ski or an LP’s skin.
It slid about, it grooved, it played
the length and lines of me, a musicness
unto breath. A tiny ceaseless death
the dentist opined then wanted cash.

It felt like wine-slosh in my brainpan.
All night I travelled in my bed, a train.
Each carriage disgorged an ailment
but this main thing only grew in size.
It happened finally to emit a claim
on my own name. It wanted out

but as me. I feigned indifference
to my external self, retained some
dignity. Soon though, unguents came
and took the resourceful fluid for a stroll.
It shook off the air and walked upright, so
everyone who saw it n…

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM EIGHTEEN

For the Boy in the Choir with Tourette’s

He slaps his face as others take communion,

A joyful disunion lurking in a devil’s abandon

That plays jerky havoc with his composure;

A boy of maybe ten or eleven, corpulent

With brown curls and a wide open stare,

Struck into the choir like a daring nail, who

Takes the music into him and jabs it out

Every third bar by an angelic shout;

I feel comforted he is up there, exposed

For all to ignore or mock. In a sea of doubt

And conceit and sin, his two-faced

Demon that winks about his eyes and mouth

Every so often with a punch to the head

Is all the compulsion I need to recognise

For all the love of Jesus a rich seam of lies

Resides within the idea of heavenly skin

Or a bag of cats roils just beneath us all

And in this sweet off-kilter boy is beautiful:

His stop-go body a rock to save stiller ones,

Says every twitching thing that crawls can sing.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM SEVENTEEN

Azoospermia

In the late summer I saw my future.

Not gaudy, hardly mine,

Brought to me by a blunt test.

The trees were alert to the wind.

Parents threw their dismal joy

And busy disorder about

The streets. The park strained

At its collar, barked with playing;

The hours in my head abruptly

Stuck. Now I was sterile.

All my weird kids blinked out

UFOS off the radar –

In a moment that stayed around

Like an invasion long planned,

That held its breath, that froze

My bones to my mouth –

I tasted the invisible loss

Of hopes going out. Maudlin,

So private, but pain occurs

Even when the reason’s sentimental.

I attempted profound respect

For nature. Nodded sagely

At my secret body’s amazing failure.

Considered new identities –

A renewed gender. Freed

From the requirement to breed,

I momentarily thrilled at time,

Now heaped, big, before me –

No Daddy-wasting anymore –

I’d learn Chinese, particle physics –

Hard to be ordinary when rare –

Free from expecting anything –

I gave my wife the gift of nothing –

I planted autumn in our gar…

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM SIXTEEN

Sonnet

No children;
Cold uncoils in the blood;
Science, true, not good
For you. So old,
Suddenly, or so young.
Lyric inside not to be sung.
Plug pulled, screen gone.
Sun out; mind
Bountiful, playing pain.
These are my children
In my head. Unbegotten.
This is to self-forget,
To have the future
Born forgotten.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM FIFTEEN

When All My Disappointments Came at Once

I greeted them as guests,
brought them in and settled their burdens
with footstools, olives and cool white wine.

This was a delicate stage –
they’d never met in one room before –
had circled warily in the past, strangers

to themselves if not to me (for I
had often expected, if not them,
others with equal claim on my time).

Now, none of my hospitality paid off
for they began to quarrel
over who would take my will to go on

first – each wanted to be the foremost cause
of my early failure to maintain a living.
Frames came off nails; books spilled; lights

fell like building blocks; stains spread.
During their intensity of competition
I took off over the garden wall, refreshed.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM FOURTEEN

‘God has left us like a girl’

after a line from Sidney Keyes

She has gone, out of the house
And down the stairs, her scent
Evident and sweet as lilacs,
Shaping her descent in the air,
Leaving us alone to pray
That tomorrow, again, she will
Deign to, lightly, reappear.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM THIRTEEN

ON LEARNING OF THE MURDER OF MANOLIS FOUR YEARS LATER

What to do with this?
He was the taverna owner
On the island we honeymooned on.
He’d stand behind the counter, show us the fish;

I recall his wife more, she’d bring us our retsina, the bill.
They had a bunch of boys, all nice lads, who brought the bread.
We’d sit on the terrace, above their home, dream of moving there.
Every time we came back to Hydra, we’d seek them out, return

For the welcome, the freshness. I read now they were
Tied up by five men, the married couple, and he was
Tortured to tell them where the jewels and money
Hid. I didn’t know about any other fortune

Beyond their friends, family, good food.
Manolis died, she survived.
There is evil in this.
I move from shape, form, language,

Plan revenge – but that’s useless.
I have no skills in that department,
And we know killing never resurrects.
My eloquence terminates at the harbour,

Deepens into inconsequence.
It’s part of the awful
Dishing out of undeserved fates
I’ve gained experience of

In th…

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM TWELVE

Mainstream Love Hotel

The night we washed up late in South Japan –
our first night after we’d clashed –
we found ourselves finally falling in
to an old smashed-up Love Hotel.
We could picture our small lit-up room
down by the woman who doled out her keys
as if they were dog collars for the unbound.
We edged ever upwards, floor by floor,
not wanting to use the pinball machine, rum,
coin-slot bed, glowing dildo, or karaoke mic,
while a blue fan rattled, rolled like
we were being beaten round inside
some smooth hot-headed drum. Like in a plane
we half-slept, lights red as looped fuck films ran.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM ELEVEN

Taking Tea with Charles Bernstein

Lapsang Souchong with a lapsed sous chef;

Charles enjoys its smoky aroma and tarry taste.

Keemun with a Communard;

Charles delights in a lightly-scented nutty flavour.

Yunnan with a U-turning UN man;

Charles likes the maltiness with milk.

Gunpowder with Guy Fawkes;

Charles notes the soft honey taste, the little bang of it.

Chun Mee with Connie Chung;

Charles raises his eyebrows at its smoothness.

Oolong with Long John Silver;

Charles eschews milk and sugar, not wanting them to dominate.

Ti Kwan Yin with a typist quite intuitive;

Charles swoons at the fragrant infusion.

Pouchong with Pol Pot;

Charles is suspicious of the very sweet, stylish taste.

Pai Mu Tan Imperial with a pretty tanned empress;

Charles notes the small buds of this rare, white tea.

Yin Zhen with L. Cohen;

Charles spits out the silvery needles.

Jasmine with a Jass band;

Charles sits in with Bix and finds delicate modern time.

Rose Congou with a Belgian from the Congo;

Charles admires the great skill used in t…

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM TEN

The Ministry of Emergency Situations

During an emergency, all
Wedding rings must be removed
And citizens will be asked to
Undress in the streets. The Ministry
Will bathe those affected with
Disinfectant Foam. They must ensure
Their eyes are shut. Those who refuse
To take off jewellery, tokens
Of affection, clothes, will be shot.
The fully naked will dance in
The medical shower, then be
X-rayed and scanned by magnets.
Inspections will go on. The cleansed
Will be allowed to request
Compensation for their torn rags,
Irradiated keepsakes.
The Ministry of Songs will form
A choir, and douse them in anthems.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM NINE

The Recording Artist

‘Wonderful, wonderful’ – Johnny Mathis

My father, among other things, was sometimes sad
And he also sang, just like Johnny Mathis, to us
At night, seated on the left hand of our pillowed heads

His face turned slightly upwards, gracefully, to the side:
The image and sound of him I had when he died –
So that, despite the many hours when he cried out

This memory, not the others, will rise to mind –
Not in order to prove that love is better than suffering
But to record, in my deepest groove, his tenor’s loveliness.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM EIGHT

On His Wedding

Rising early as if for a duel, seconded
By a best man, I wake to sky that’s bleu céleste,
Rented tails, and fresh anxiety, but bride
And groom do not turn backs to pace. We
Collide at an altar, as though it was a super-
Conductor. As old Wagner marches
You up the aisle, my awe wells up at what is
Brought in: veiled, molecular, still flowing out.
Your entrance is an atomic favour, for witnesses
Observe us, met here not to cut, but sew space
Rent in multi-fabrics. Our cells push and pull,
Mysterious as that new-smashed meson X(3872).
Side-by-side, apart, like shadow and
Direct flame crossing to overlap, as a rosy flower
Sometimes is mistaken for its name.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM SEVEN

Trick

Karla is eight.

Her whole body is folded like a napkin used in a trick.

Folded and folded over again.

A red napkin.

Folded and folded, then swallowed.

Out it comes, from somebody’s ear.

Slowly, knotted.

Nobody says: it isn’t the same one.

For her next trick Karla will stay under water, silent.

Until she wants to.

TODD SWIFT SAMPLE POEM SIX