David Susswein

This is not the witching hour
that passed hours and years ago
this is the night of fireworks endlessly falling
of distantly visible arcus clouds
fragmenting into the shapes of pregnant warplanes

The house settles upon its foundations
every creek and sigh
a reconciliation for my bones
where such weariness is, etched
into the cells of my marrow.

I stand
to lay my hand, once again,
on my Scythe, my black-echoed Cloak
to ride
once again

into the humans’ infinities of wars.

In the fall and crush of the wrecking wave
where the abandoned sailors, weeping
pray alone; deus misereatur

In the dimmest light of day descending
where the fumes of civilisation cut the
open wounds, deus misereatur

In the fall and shower of love upon
the head of the loved, who does not love
and cries, deus misereatur

In the fall of rain on the clay baked
in the mother’s calming womb: spits on her
daughter, deus misereatur

In the hunger of lust that comes unto
us, where the skin touching as the setting
sun bleeds its colours on the earth and the
moon breaks, as the lovers taste each other
in a dream in which neither is a part,
and in the bitterness of unanswered
echoes after near-sleeping, the lover’s soundless
plea, deus misereatur

When the voice has run hoarse like the wolves
howling, as the pain of living has ruined day
and night, deus misereatur

When the mother’s womb has spawned another ‘hero’,
and the son forsakes his child, the orphaned
world cries, deus misereatur

When another morning has come, and with the
cockerel cries a thread of grey storms, the clouds
forewarn, deus misereatur

When all the longing I have felt for you
has burned its roots and lays ash on my tongue,
I wail, deus misereatur

When the sky is black where hope is dream
in a land without night, and the creaking
world swells to bursting the scream of nothing
over the heads of the still living… In
the bed soaked in blood that has been bled
over you, by somnambulist dreamers
run into the chased caverns of night, of the nightmare
inside a nightmare hounding out the breath
of pity, closed… closing a clenched fist to love.

And alone in all the useless wanting;
among the toys of childhood, they are all
broken, deus misereatur

If the ending of laughter is the sound
of waking… I cut myself to bleed in
to your cracked dry lips; my blood
all that remains to me; an emptiness of failing words.

this year… I had forgotten you.
not exceptional, I had forgotten almost everyone

I had forgotten my mother, sister, brother
and all friends

I was thinking only of me,
my mask-wearing, wash-handed
diluted me

I was wearing a mask,
but it was not a mask
it was a metaphor

to be in pain and see: clouds
covering the whole sky
that never lift

but if they did:
see me
naked

not really caring about my fellow man,
just scared and scared and scared.

Waking up, breathless and covered
in my own sweat.

catching a glimpse
a train window smear
catching a glimpse
that certain face
her golden hair, prism’s light
divided against itself

magazine posters or dreams of avarice
the watched watching briefly,
girls and men stumble
pushing prams and talking,
casting poses for attention
pausing for the world to take note,

have i seen the face before?
been caught looking,
uneager to return the stare
doubt and uncertainty,
make my heart beat faster,
struggling to be free

she wore a cocked hat, that
certain parting of her hair;
copied in posters, hairdressers,
the train leaving the station,
she does, she turns to look up at me,
i am nothing more

gossiping mothers, children skipping
awaken world! the dull green
and useless lives, the
cemented over aerodrome,
future’s promise in childhood so
sweet, ages sour in this the year

into an introspection of a printed
circuit, appearance is being;
the stars as curtain decorations
on the permanently falling stage,
drift away from me; for i am not moving
wave to me? leaving, leaving.

the beautiful people
visit hairdressing saloons
criss-cross their feet, in relaxed posture
laugh at the stylist’s sly comment

the beautiful people
link elbows in human chains
dance across busy roads, gaily
ignoring puddles of rain

the beautiful people
sail-through high pressure jobs
air-kiss their way to the top,
delighting even the office-cleaners

the beautiful people
fall out of love as easy as breathing
leave a wreckage of lives in their wake
and continue on, with even less than a sigh.

i can’t see no vision i’m blinded
i see:
Houston in rivers,
the whiteman and blackman.

swimming in a pearl of sot.

looking out! the news, worldwide is about.

but i don’t live there.

i live in Freetown, Sierra Leone
i live in Karachi, Pakistan
i live where the dying are.

i am drowning and i am dying.
my skin is too grey or black,
my pocketbook is too unfilled

Lloyd’s insurance of last resort
will never cover me.
i’m too dirty, polluted, worthless.

I Am the First; soon, you will suffer this way too.