waiting
the soil is waiting for our bodies
like a sweaty obligation,
and the trees and grass
are expecting to assume us shortly
like a guilt, like a cloak of memory
and tattered words we dropped
to stand naked before a god
that never was,
to stand for a world
where words were
as if
it is as if the lake and mountain,
the forest and the stars,
as if the animals and the night itself
were screaming
though only you are screaming,
it is as if this nothing here
were being
memories are made
memories are made of this
imperfection, the drip, drip, drip
of the sun on missing roofs
and saviors falling into puerile
abnegation, like babies
denying that there may be games
to play later. memories are made
of scum and some suffering;
there are far too many faces
with skin on them,
there are far too many hearts
beating in dead men
a sound thrashing
and words give one another a sound thrashing
precisely like love does
words and the massy mouth
whence nothing comes,
where nothing does
body and blood
the body and its blood are free
and never to be sacralized again
to the slightest extent -
only in the secular can memory breathe
and night be its rage in us,
loving and loveless;
beyond the hieratic establishment
of holy or profane families
lies freedom and what bodies need,
blood enough to be
nothing ever returns
nothing ever returns
though it seem the same
bloodless indifference;
and the essence of words
is retention, repetition and failure
inevitable;
literature being nothing -
the gross pale ghost
better than the life itself
that it never bothered to live,
that will never return;
words the impotent corpses
of nothings, of missing things
the soil is waiting for our bodies
like a sweaty obligation,
and the trees and grass
are expecting to assume us shortly
like a guilt, like a cloak of memory
and tattered words we dropped
to stand naked before a god
that never was,
to stand for a world
where words were
as if
it is as if the lake and mountain,
the forest and the stars,
as if the animals and the night itself
were screaming
though only you are screaming,
it is as if this nothing here
were being
memories are made
memories are made of this
imperfection, the drip, drip, drip
of the sun on missing roofs
and saviors falling into puerile
abnegation, like babies
denying that there may be games
to play later. memories are made
of scum and some suffering;
there are far too many faces
with skin on them,
there are far too many hearts
beating in dead men
a sound thrashing
and words give one another a sound thrashing
precisely like love does
words and the massy mouth
whence nothing comes,
where nothing does
body and blood
the body and its blood are free
and never to be sacralized again
to the slightest extent -
only in the secular can memory breathe
and night be its rage in us,
loving and loveless;
beyond the hieratic establishment
of holy or profane families
lies freedom and what bodies need,
blood enough to be
nothing ever returns
nothing ever returns
though it seem the same
bloodless indifference;
and the essence of words
is retention, repetition and failure
inevitable;
literature being nothing -
the gross pale ghost
better than the life itself
that it never bothered to live,
that will never return;
words the impotent corpses
of nothings, of missing things
David McLean is from Wales but has lived in Sweden since 1987. He
lives there with partner, dog and cats. In addition to six
chapbooks, McLean is the author of three full-length poetry
collections: CADAVER’S DANCE (Whistling Shade Press, 2008), PUSHING
LEMMINGS (Erbacce Press, 2009), and LAUGHING AT FUNERALS (Epic Rites
Press, 2010). His first novel HENRIETTA REMEMBERS is coming shortly.
More information about David McLean can be found at his blog
http://mourningabortion.
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