MATTHEW CALEY

Lines Written Upon A Prophylactic Found In A Brixton Gutter

O useless balloon, supine, not the colour of dolor
but see-thru, salmon-pink, plugged with your load of ore
draped in a grating side by side
with imploded pizza-stars and half a crepe.

Squished jellfish of desire, trodden under the fly-boy trainers
of crack-dealers by the Taxi-rank and noodle-bar
—witness to a union of souls or alleyway tremble—
spermicidal eel, you know the perfidious trade-routes,

how the underground waters of the Effra
destabilise our feet, how pomegranate or melon-seeds
from the glass-arcades stuck in the tread of our boots

might spring up a rash of fruit trees in the inner city
sometime and knowing also how joy is brief [and rarely sanctioned by the Pontiff]
you dangle-drop, precariously, swim out for the open sea.

 

 

Towards A Philosophy Of Speed

Baby, if the burden of being the fastest thing ever seen or heard
          is granted to the paper-plane or humming-bird
                    hurtled down the central aisle of Concorde,

then a fat man running away
          from himself is the very definition of velocity,
                    baby, even his aftermath-blur achieves solidity.

Nothing can ever be what it never was again.

Then this CCTV-footage shows us, not baby / boy / man,
          baby, but loops of white-chalk failing to confine
                    what flees its own outline like a fast cartoon

to still the cog-wheels of our intent
          so that we live, baby, always inside the moment
                    before something happens and the moment after it hasn't.

That our eyes perceive colours at different speeds.
          If a conductor's baton was red instead
                    of white, baby, the symphony they were conducting would
                              proceed at a slightly slower speed,

—baby. Nothing can ever be what it never was again—

so we might fuck, die, sleep, wake again
          in the time it takes the slowcoach moon
                    to burn an inverse sun-spot through the curtain.

 

 

The Measurement Of Quims

                    after Rufinus

Diana The Hunter's
was neat as a skiff
bobbing on the little

loch of her lap. Whereas
Phoebe's was more a trireme,
leaving its wheat-blonde V

of a wake
and splendidly be-quiffed.
Sylphide's, though

was the scary craft to row,
black-laquered gondola across The Styx
with sleek

fur like a jaguar. Mere mortal
—s might drown
or never return.

I can't swim
so have to trust these craft —
their many variations on the theme.

But yours
is where I quaff
the deepest draught—

coracle, catamaran, liferaft.

 

 

Cul-De-Sac

Apparently, I proceeded in an easterly direction, with no lack
of temerity. Saw the wild bayberry-blossom
of the sink-estate.
A stranger uprooted and said. 'Not that way, mate, it's a cul-de-sac'.

He placed great stress on the 'de'. There was now no turning back.
By then, we were headlong into each other
you, humbled below me, turned the other way, your shoulder-blades
                                      moving like skimmed slates over tawny water.

To sleep with anyone is risk,
—the virus of love, the virus of obligation— the fear of being opened to any
                                      turn
of events. Strange then that after, you formally donned a sleep-mask
as if not wanting to witness a burglar break suddenly into your home.

There are those who believe that, as it and us share swirling molecules,
                                      we can walk through solid matter.

D-d-d don't wait for me by the spider-web scintillations
of the broken kiosk. I won't be back.

 

Matthew Caley's debut collection 'Thirst' (Slow Dancer, 1999) was nominated for The Forward Prize For
Best First Collection. Since then he's been Poet-In-Residence at The Poetry Society Cafe and third and
second in recent National Poetry Competitions. His second collection 'The Scene Of My Former Triumph'
(Wrecking Ball Press, 2005) has just been published. He's also co-editor with Stephen Lannin of 'Pop
Fiction: The Song In Cinema' (Intellect, 2005).

Available from Amazon.co.uk:

Pop Fiction: The Song in Cinema (Intellect Books, 2005)
Thirst (Slow Dancer, 1999)
The Rat's Mirror (Lapwing Publications, 1999)
Sirens: The Brixton Soundtrack (Slow Dancer, 1995)
Dancing in the lone star diner (Slow Dancer, 1988)
Hicks (Echo Room, 1986)
Thirteen (Sunk Island Publishing, 1986)


Wrecking Ball Press | Intellect Books