Season Poem (for Johannesburg) 1. Another Winter; each is different Each is fringed with last year’s Arthritic twigs and blackened grass, But each denies the past’s nostalgia. With half an eye on next year’s possibilities, Each day pursues the driven linearity Which brings each to an inevitable death. Always the conclusion escapes. The trees plan new strategies, More melancholy configurations Another suggestion of beauty. 2. Our measurements fail to capture The logic of another season. So we fail to understand; There is no war between progress and regeneration. Glass and concrete do not obscure the sun And a warmer time brings no hope to silent pavements. But a warmth returns – The days stretch themselves, without anticipation. Nor can we anticipate tomorrow By homage to a dismembered or imagined past Spring brings us no comfort. 3. We run out of names, So one year becomes another. The sun of summer flings shadows as seeds. They bear fruit, become the darkness By which we know the light. The roads are shadowless and sticky-hot And lead to suburbs full of silence. There, leisure falls to those Who claim it as a right. Harsh is the fear which penetrates their calm. 4. Autumn draws together the myriad strands, Forms a nexus; A waiting. As the days close they anticipate their deaths, And so are like us, who give them names. We fear the calling of the seasons to this point Where nothing is inevitable. For unlike theirs, the fading of another of our years Is a presage of some ultimate conclusion; Bloody or silent. ~ Semaphore Every morning When I wake up There's a moment When I can hear Everything. If I listen There's no longer An inside or an outside. Nor even, it seems, The faint but total Susurration of white noise. Is the pretence of silence A comfort? Have even the satellites Fallen quiet? Then a dog barks A distant caw. I go back to sleep. ~ Terra Nullius We depend On the idea Of a horizon. It shapes our understanding, Our viewpoint Both of eye and mind. With that finiteness To bound us We can make plans, As long as nothing Gets in the way. We need the picture plane To have its vanishing point Uninterrupted. The landscape of our future Needs to be empty. We cannot write Our dreams of time On the proximate walls That press in On us. ~ ![]() James Sey is a Scottish poet, writer and multimedia artist, based in Johannesburg, South Africa. He has performed alongside rock bands and on spoken word platforms, often in performances incorporating video and sound art. His poetry has appeared in print journals and online, and his non-fiction, journalism and academic art writing is widely published.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
StrandsFiction~Poetry~Translations~Reviews~Interviews~Visual Arts Archives
November 2023
Categories |