Peter Lilly: Poems

Last Christmas, I gave you my heart  I had the pleasure of featuring on the beautiful Christmas Special of the wonderful poetry podcast Eat the Storms , Christmas special.  In this special episode I read three poems about Christmas of decreasing silliness: "The Shepherd's #Christmas", "A Christmas Carol" and "Christmas Day". The second two appear in my 2nd collection " A Handful of Prayers ", and the 3rd was originally published on Ekstasis. You can listen to me, and the other wonderful readers here: This was the third time I had the pleasure of appearing on the podcast. All poetry fans are indebted to  Damien B. Donnelly  for his hard work, passion and faithfulness in producing it.

'Two others also, who were criminals, were led away to be put to death with him.' Calendar's rhythm thuds. The kick drum rattles your rib cage As collective memories and communal routines Plume like dust from that undulating skin. ..... You must wrap gifts in superfluous paper, ..... That's tradition. ..... Yet repeating acts to underline thankfulness, ..... That's superstition. Calendar's rhythm thuds And we bellow through that dust cloud, Clearing our throats and averting our eyes. THUD For the drum announces the sales THUD The rhythm is the anthem of vacation gifts. So discard the old and ugly, To find the beauty, To spend and to own.  'They came to the place that is called The Skull ' Excited skin bristles. Chill shivers the spine in want For purpose and ergonomics dim in contrast To the lights, and the efficacious movement of the crowd. ..... So much spectacle, ..... All these plate glass doors, ...

I thought I'd smash some glass, spill some liquid, so I clicked it, clicked it. But the bottle was not tangible, though before my eyes in three dimensions it was flat as paper. Only static rises, so it is never wind that blows your hair. Plastic progress masks the faces of unnecessary despair. What tastes remain in your pixels? Your pockets of MSG delicacies? Your dunce assimilation and mind-ache? Breathing silly soundbites, broadcasting solutions to the vast ocean of immediate me, my and mine: Shackles for time in mirrors. Only static rises, so it is never wind that blows your hair. Plastic progress masks the faces of unnecessary despair. All who take part are lost in mirrors, but somewhere, somebody is still breathing and should write their breath with ink and paper and truly commit in the truth that there is some freedom in patience. A poem I wrote about Patience, roughly 3 years ago. I did s...

Litter grew around us, teeth gritted in impatience for the filthy fruit of our consumption, that is transported from beyond the individualist's horizon. Your universe hates you when the lights are off, shutting its eyes to your waking, and all those words you bring to life as you read from pages that appear as you turn them. Anaesthesia dissolves the teeth leaving you with mysterious bite marks and bitter amnesia, it clouds the resolve of your blinkers and your mirrored walls. Echoes of outside draw its fingernails across chalk boards of yet to learn lessons, coughing up childhood traumas of empathy. They drain opaque from your worldview and leave you with the monsters, and the monstrous landfill skyline that scowls at your children's future. Yet beyond that refuse view there are leaves with the colours of depth. There is living matter never to be synthesised, and mass produced. There is an oceans of faces, ev...

So the rungs of your ladder  became blades. But you would never chase your fingerprints as they fall, and a rumour of identity will lie on the blood-stained birthing floor, along with your name and your first pair of tiny shoes. All waiting for the teeth of scavengers. The metallic surface up here has been weathered rough like your face you have forgotten; another discarded picture, ruined by blind obsession. The wind from above whispers only despair as the portraits on currency are merely official black-ink-pop-art. Those notes of paper  take up no space, they communicate nothing, but  flitter a mocking snicker in the blustering; worthless as leaves. Echoes screech for answers in the frustrated perpetual motion of a monologue that wishes for conversation, because all your companion s took their own tributaries and disappeared in distance. With hindsight we can see that they took with them all the scraps of meaning...