Old Poems by Colin Ward

POEMS and APHORISMS by Colin Ward


The following poems and aphorisms are arranged from Colin's first stumbling efforts (near the top) down to more recent efforts. Please feel free to comment on them; your feedback is very much appreciated. To see his latest works, please click here.



Dark Neighbourhood

They're so proud of their angry dismay

As they prowl through this dark neighbourhood

These loud voices with nothing to say

Will all need to be misunderstood

Click here
for a reading of
"Dark Neighbourhood".



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Poet Valedictorian
Before we graduate
to graveyards
I would like to say

something


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Deaf Girl Dancing

Sways to rhythms only she makes clear
Moves to sounds even she can't hear
Out of step with others prancing near
Come to see the deaf girl dancing here


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Knowing
Disconnected
Angels I, II and III
Bottles
Nature
The Oldest Profession
Radicals
The Value of Pie
Some
The Manhattans
Thirty Below
Southern Comfort
Ward's Law
Forbidden
Thick Smoke
Testimony
Desparacidos/Pulse
On FM Radio
On Track
Tombstone
White Rose
The Grannies
Replaced
Poets
Verbos
The Last Infidel
Ex Post Coitus
Requiem
Electrocution
Emancipation
Duplicity
Central Park
Modesty
Circle
Geese
Acrophobia
In the End
Bound
Cosmos
Vietnam
Promise
The Way Home
Faces
Azteca
White Lines
Sex, War and Ferris Wheels
Jealous Fans
Burma
Mythology
Praetor Dominum
Beginning
Echoes
Connected
Pluto
Lawyer John
By the Pond
Restless
Detente
Footnotes
Mandalas
Words
Jericho Manhattan
Widower
Mourning Constitutional
Sunday
L'Homme Brûlant
In Genders
December
The Faces of Eve
---



Knowing

Knowing what is best
for others
Is the first act
of war.

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Disconnected

I came from a Catholic family
So when I looked at my monitor
And saw the message:


"Disconnected from the host"


I panicked.

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Angels II

The damnedest thing
about angels:
They are always
in disguise
They creep
into your life
like thieves
They take
what you were
Leaving only
what you own

"And there's no defence
against angels,"
preached the derelict,
swigging repellant.
"No defence..."
Then
with a glance
into his future
through the genie bottle
in his hands
he added:
"...except booze..."
Angels III

Grace visited us
too briefly
Then,
like water
finding its level
like quicksilver
finding its own
She...

A beggar showed up at her funeral
The mourners clucked
about the gall
of the gauche
And shunted
the man away

I smiled.
Grace was back,
Her first trip
A failure
Angels IV

No callouses, no cracks
No crucifixion marks
on his hands
A whore on lease
to moneyless hordes
A whore at least
to pitiless lords
His passion a pose
at political parties
Witless witness
of wine and weed
The limousine liberal
fighting a war
of libation.

But must we see
spin doctors
To spot a poxed truth?
Forget the ghouls and gossips
The rest of us prefer
all the hypocrisy
of angels
to the sincerity
of demons.

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Bottles
These bottles float on my memories
Of passed relationships
I catch the ones that return to me
And press them to my lips


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Nature
As a child
I raced to the precipice
eager to hear my echo

On the beach
my grandmother turned
to study her footprints

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The Oldest Profession
Long before
the commodity of comfort
There were poets
to describe it
Defined not
by what they sold
But by what
they withheld
These words
come at a cost

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Radicals
They believe
that, like the dead,
They can get nowhere
until they get

carried away

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The Value of Pie
She bent her hips
And stroked her thigh
She licked her lips
And so did I

At 3:14
She asked if I
Could have foreseen
Such valued pie

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Some
Some will ignore
what they know
And fight
for what they believe

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The Manhattans
Sitting among broken oaks
and prancing willows
Chief of the Manhattans
surveys the bounty

of blankets and beads

taken in trade

for his island home


He grins
at the snow-skinned man

before him
"Now that we have sold you
the land," he asks,
"Can we interest you
in the sky?"

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Thirty Below
"It's cold", you say
"Ice eternal."
"Let me tell ya:

Ain't a good day
for external
genitalia."

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Southern Comfort
I ran from the messiah

Seeking the familiar
comfort of ignorance
And, no, I didn't catch her name

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Ward Law
Put freedom to a vote
and let the people choose
'cause in the end you'll note
that it will always lose

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Forbidden
We talked about Inca coca
Navajo peyote
Rasta ganja
As we sipped our sacramental wine

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Thick Smoke
From powder or pyre
Thick smoke we could see
Falling fleshward at
Dachau/Wounded Knee

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Testimony
The final test of testimony:
The sacred without sanctimony

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Here are the two poems published in " Talus and Scree ":
Desaparecidos


The wolf descended on the sheep
expecting terror and bleating
Not an old man with a ladle
inviting him to join the family for dinner
Seeing the surprise on his guest's face
the old one asked:
"Is mess hall food so good
that you can resist home cooking?"

The predator feasted
on spicy soup
and fresh bread rolls
before taking his hosts

At the doorway the old man said
"Winter is here,"
and offered his captor a sweater

The sheep are gone now
But the wolf wears their wool
Pulse


Should I hide
like a Jekyl
Until my sundried bones
write their signature
in the sand?

Or should I wait
until the heavy reign
of light
drowns our last illusion?

I reach
for the lampstand
A finger on your pulse
A finger on the trigger

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The Single Ballet Theory
Once known, we choose
to not extoll
The lonely news
that we are whole

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On FM Radio
Driving in my car
through Motown and Country
I heard Cohen's "Priests"
and Ferron's "Shadows on a Dime".
Poignant. Intricate. Thoughtful.

But don't these poets know
that this is what people
turn on their radios
to avoid?

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On Track
We were just friends then

Standing on the tracks

Far behind us
a freight train

edged closer
Ahead of us
on our horizon

the rails

seemed to converge

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Tombstone

Mortality
gives us something
that "omniscient" gods
can never know

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Early in his life Colin was inspired by the fiery rhetoric of Dolores Ibarruru, aka la Pasionada: "No pasaran!" ("They shall not pass!"), and by the resistance of Mohammed Ail and the German anti-Nazi White Rose resistance pamphleteers, Hans and Sophie Scholl. Imagine Colin's surprise when, three days after writing the following poem, he chanced upon this picture of the Scholls (Colin's physical resemblance to them is quite striking) while web surfing!

Sophie and her brother, Hans, were captured and tortured by the Nazis in 1943. Today, people around the world commemorate the Sholl's sacrifice by wearing a white rose on February 22nd, the date when they were executed.

White Rose

Mohammed Ali
die Weisse Rose
y la Pasionaria
need not speak
to remind us
of when sanity
was illegal.


Grannies

I could never see
what is not there
were it not
for los abuelos

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Replaced

Evolution culminates
in the television.
Mine broke.
Bought a new one.
Still looking for something
that can't be replaced.

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Poets
The difference
between poets and others
Is that others flush

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Verbos
Él esta
Ella es

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1000 Points of Light
We dim our lights
A thousand ways
Narcotic nights
And moonshine daze

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AfterLife
Born

Graduated

Married

Died.

It seems that everything begins
with good-byes

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The Last Infidel
As children
we all believed

in the tooth fairy

and found coins

under our pillows
As adults
we wonder

if God will be born

from the grave

of the last infidel

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Ex Post Coitus
No goodbyes
between us
Thieves
are never grateful

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Requiem
We've come to where eternity
and life both boldly marched.

Another drop flows out to sea
and leaves the land more parched.

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Electrocution

Lightning coursed through
my veins

Older now
I remember the madness
fondly

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Emancipation
If slaves cannot serve two masters

then those of us who serve so many
must be free

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Duplicity

Lies tell us twice as much
as the truth

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Central Park

Another gambol
Another gamble

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Modesty
Atropos hides her charms
Behind a checkered flag

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Circle
Most of us die
in a foetal position.

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Geese
Travellers, honking
and waving goodbye
fall

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Acrophobia
Afraid of falling?
Or jumping?

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In the End

Children always have
the last word

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Bound

Trains ran on time

Bound
for Auschwitz

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Explanation


"Cosmos" was inspired
by a documentary stating
that 8-12 billion years
after the Big Bang
we have suns
dated at 17 billion years old.
Cosmos


Sun stars burn
Before the Big Bang

Leaves scatter
Slower than the wind

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Vietnam

Rust sleeps
after burning out
a Patton tank
Abandoned
Barrel broken
Turret pointed
toward the sun


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Vietnam II

As fact forms mystery
And speakers don't dare
We can't write history
While people still care

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Promise

Young widow cries
"He said he'd never leave me."

Promise kept
broken
and unfulfilled.

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The Way Home

Every road
a dead end

But some lead
all the way
to the ocean

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Faces


Mirror shows the trace route
But our recall
approaches imagination

I still see my sunbeam bride
Eyesight fades faster
than memory

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Azteca
Hummingbird days
flit past, chased
by jaguar nights

Ancient tablet reads:
"Time is hunger
in motion
"

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White Lines

Polecat
on the freeway
Cracks a smile
at the white line
Between reason
and fearful pleasure

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Sex, War and Ferris Wheels

Up, down, circling

Cardiac clench, bones mesh

Surrounded by arms


Proto-human surfaces

Showered in body fluids

Loving only

what was at risk

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Jealous Fans

Dumb critics
Sonic showers of applause
The heroin(e) of the moment
We coveted the accolades

Older now
We envy the talent

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Burma

Still miles from Myanmar
and Aung San Suu Kyi
Wading through jungle

Like black green sea

Dark at noon


Swamp and vine

Slow our steps

Back home

It is tomorrow already

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Mythology

The battlefield has changed since Custer
Tourist paths around naked markers

It changed again after John Wayne
And once more after Dustin Hoffman

Someone behind me said:
"History is legend, spiced with hubris."

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Praetor Dominum

Even as the weapon

whispers madness
Haunted by hungers

We seek the protection

of peril

The lamb knows peace

without freedom
The lion

knows neither

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Beginning

Our performance
made us forget

audition and rehearsal

Time began
and ended

after wasted youth
Chanced upon
your event horizon

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Echoes

Two old men
on sunlit bench

in Pigeon Park

Did they speak
in mother tongue

of homeland lost?

Discussion

of absent friend

or ancient scar?

Was their talk
of Anne Marie

That flower pressed
by yellowed leaves?

No.


Waiting for night

Two souls basked

in silent communion

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Connected
Before this mass communion

We were mad Trappists

Our disparate clamour

Stretched unheard

across the tundra

Now, steppenwolves howl

on databanks

by info streams


Swept up
in this lightning storm
Few raindrops notice
that the puddles

have become

an ocean

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Pluto

We were introduced
when you visited

my sleep

Dark and distant

Stark and silent

Completing us

Something
that just had to be

out there

somewhere

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Lawyer John

Hooker prone. Helpless.
Her Chasey Lain stare lured him
Like a siren's call.

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By the Pond

They never spoke
of triggering dreams
Intimacy
bordered by silence

She trusted her eyes

The pebbles he threw

Blurred their reflection

Better than boulders

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Restless

He was spent

But she remained
a masterpiece

unfinished


Leading him back

She quoted the partisan

"A peace

without justice

is surrender."

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Detente

This cold accord, these lonely kings

Divide the weak, avoid a fight

Mere shell cocoons by monarch wings

With boldness born towards the light

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Footnotes

Media kings cluck

"Unpaid ad!"


Their half-open hands

quiver for coin


No cameras catch

the ribbon cutting


Companies notice

the very lack of it


Indifference passes

into corporate religion



Other footnotes burn

in cauldron memory


Rising like smoke

from Sobibor


Chiffoned monks, shaman's rattle

and druid's tree


The calls of Montezuma

trail off


History and news

the tail of the dog


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Mandalas

Before the cold
A star goes by
Streaks red and gold
On canvas sky

Her musings play
Like Persian weaves
She rakes away
The red gold leaves

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Words

It was you
who told me

That chaos is the fascist word
for freedom


Speak well
and I will understand
Speak better
and I won't

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Jericho Manhattan

We saw it on the news
Walls crumbling

Looked at each other
Walls
Crumbling

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Widower

Old sage among fool's parsley
he endured us

Slum lights strobed, spectres danced
as Dad spoke of her


"The cost of any gift
is in living without it."

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Mourning Constitutional
Too early

No coffee

Morning stroll

You spooked me

With that morbid bullshit:

"Every footfall
a gravesite

On this planet
made sacred

by forgotten sorrow."

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Sunday

Catfish smiles
at the pregnant fly

hovering like a host

overhead


Cloud shadows
bring zephyrs

lavender incense

willow jigs


Rod and reel
communion and rapture

in the healing waters

of the lured

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L'Homme Brûlant

Flames scatter me
Like ground skin snow
Like ice to sea
Where Innu go

The smoke a line
A cobra sway
A dragon spine
To skies soon gray

A spartan truth
Survives the pyre
Again like youth
My flesh on fire

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In Genders


Kneading
her diamond knucklestar
The widow stood

Like every woman

Immortal

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December

"So this is where
we will have met."

She smiled beneath
her cancer wig.


Avoiding all
the politics
Of corset, crease
and cummerbund.

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_____ Don't you just hate it when people preface a poem with some longwinded explanation? Sadly, like footnotes to a play written in Old English, this one requires a little background knowledge of Martian geology, natural history and mythology.

_____ "The Faces of Eve" is based on the picture of a face on Mars (considered distinctly Neanderthal by expert observers). This mesa formation has inspired considerable conjecture--especially in light of the fact that Mars not only had rivers at one point but may also have had an oxygen-based atmosphere (which would have since imploded, obviously). Currently, an eggshell of ice rings the core of the planet, covered by a thickening layer of oxygen-rich blasted rock/sand. If life of any significant sort were to exist on the planet it would have to be in the "greenhouse" created by this protective layer of ice.

_____ That the features on the face of Mars are distinctly Neanderthal is said to be consistent with the need for a natural "visor" against the strong sun; the larger chests consistent with the thinning atmosphere. These adaptations did not help Earth's population; their greater size made it far more difficult for them to survive stretches of famine. Their technology, which was originally superior to that of our ancestors, eventually fell behind it. The last Neanderthals died out in the mountainous Basque region of what is now Spain.

_____ Now, the mythology and/or popular conjecture: What if our atmosphere were imploding? What would we do? Given our current level of technology, we would likely send some of our people to whatever other nearby planet had oxygen before the bulk of our population retreated below ground. Over the centuries the ill-fated "colonists" and those remaining behind (who form the "voice" here) might well lose contact (for a variety of possible reasons) and forget about each other's existence. To those left behind (who form the voice of this poem) the colonists would pass from history into legend, then myth and, finally, into oblivion.




The Faces of Eve

Martian winds

sandblast the beacon

rockface onto ice lens.

It becomes the sunbreak

eyelid of greenhouse home



From Neanderthal graves

the refugees watch us

burrow deeper, denying

that journeys are born

in the garden.



At night our vision,

no longer bound

by eyesight or canon,

still falls well short

of Iberian tombs.



Comments:




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Ward's Rules of Poetry

1. Never say anything in a poem that you wouldn't say in a bar.
2. If you can't be profound be vague.
3. Learn the difference between poetry and hebephrenia.
4.
The McNeilley Rule:
Cut off the last line! This will make your poem better!
(If this doesn't work, keep cutting off the last line.)
5. Sloganeering is about what you said and how you said it.
Poetry is about how you avoided saying it.
6. Poetry lies between synonyms.
7. The difference between self-expression and communication is poetry.
8. If you can't spell a word don't use it.
9. Bad poetry haunts the writer.
Good poetry haunts the reader.

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