Category Archives: Poems

it is the less than noble truths like the ones you see in mirrors that reveal the duplicity the defiance and delight admonishment and disparity of imagination so strange the alchemy the unconscious hierarchy of thought preternatural cliché the memories that brew on the outer edge illogical yet silently obtuse crooked branches like gnarled fingersContinue reading “Reflection – John McAteer”

the sadness is that I have grown weary of the snow the buses the endless signs in Arabic and the woman who keeps phoning to inform me of her commitment to suicide and how this time this time she is serious because how dare they treat her this way her of all people and byContinue reading “This time – John McAteer”

mad as a midwinter nightmare as cold and unreal and vexed astonishingly vivid desperate honest like stone crude brutal as space and wide empty full of rapture and quiet and glare all the potential of a ticket a coin labyrinth mystery woman

the road not taken is the one most travelled the clouds are full of children hidden but this reality is difficult to bear what might have been or used to be are echoes buried in the present landscapes and flowers unseen own the look of being looked at the shadow at the funeral dance criesContinue reading “This reality – John McAteer”

the end of June a crooked wind worrying the yard with ghosts unwritten songs across the wall the traffic hums evading obstacles and life below a varnished moon another war soon ending to a silence rich with dust and the blood of children and in the metal light beyond the door slow death and slowerContinue reading “Unwritten song – John McAteer”

dawn yawns without the sun just the chatter of nestlings the distant hum of traffic workmen its winter in north London footfalls in the snow sound terribly like complaining

online in another world esoteric depictions the separation of being from becoming learning dreams instead of lessons clichés of sacrifice antiquity terror unfathomable as centerefolds park in garages and foyers inscribed with the fullness of slime-rich caverns prepared incorrectly for the coming of war the afterness of copulation

cluttered days and hollow years remnants burned broken scattered with the dreams the demons the death that hurt that didn’t just beyond the door the moon trapped inside a puddle like a trophy warning now must be the time to be old when difficulties are pinned to walls as decorations tinsel

expecting nothing when something turned up winging it as usually so pleased I was when it did and I ordered pizza cheap wine and the world was wonderful though cake would have been nice and Elvis had left the building it was like a dream there was a taxi from Africa and an answer blowingContinue reading “A taxi from Africa – John McAteer”

at a table strewn with necessities whiskey paper ashtray an old man with battles lost and won with eyes that hold brutalities of prison and of priests trying to write a love poem to convince himself and everyone that many moons and years ago things were soft philosophy and friendship simple people suffer easily theContinue reading “Many moons – John McAteer”