david hay — 3 poems

Hungover in Eden

Last night I swallowed the milk of stars,
Decanted by rain
Into tulips, which we downed and downed
 Until neither of us knew our names.

When he was drunk I saw myself reflected
In him who understood nothing
But created everything.

With each word he birthed
Into the silent universe
A language I could understand
But could neither learn nor speak.

A father and a son
Blunting milkiways into being.
I was of him, but not him,
And with that realisation
My loneliness
Awoke in my blood,
And my silence mirrored his.

Eve, bored of us spitting words
Into the dusk
Touched her own truth
In the garden,
Finally free from god’s neuroticism.

There was no going back.
He knew me, but did not understand,
And I knew him, but could not understand.

The next day I ate the apple
Not because Eve had,
Though her arguments were sound.
But because his loneliness
Made my loneliness
Too much to take.

Yes I know Eve, 
Fuck  the patriarchy,
Is more logical reason,
But some sadness
Can kill even a god.



Manchester is dreaming in the night

The lonely eye of childhood lingers
Above my head.

All lives must be murdered into simplicity
To have a glance of understanding,
The skyscrapers whisper to the sky they reflect so dimly.

To a poet the sky is always full of tears,
But here below on the cig-stained streets
A homeless man asks two girls for a light,
One runs away, the other laughs and says no.

He looks at the tree oh, you can fuck off too

Man seems to be stitched together with sorrow.
I give him a light.
We each raise an eyebrow,
Silence is the language men drown in.

How foolish it is to judge
When god lies limp in the grave of night
And everyone is lost, so lost.



Too much Coffee, too little sleep

For I who awoke the lightning 
From the thunderous gloom of your eyeshadow,
Suck on the kneecaps of the dead, growling.

In the morning I watched the sun peel from my eyes,
Lighter-spark trees grew into a heaven of flames.

Sky tears silently extinguished,
Left body below, hammering curses into the dirt.

Mum no longer sees me but I see her.

The fragrance of summer song,
Dissects the dull brain sloping into the past.

Each molecule of your kiss gifted the fall its first light.

 Mornings teach insanity to suits cig-stained and far too tight.

A little wee nestles in your underwear,
And moribund tea leaves, confetti every street
Limited by a 33 year old thought.
 
Statistics slap tears from stars,
And dehydrated flowers drip memories
That tribal tattoo my boyish hands.




DAVID HAY'S debut publication is the Brexit-inspired narrative poem Doctor Lazarus. His first poetry collection is forthcoming from Rare Swan Press. His debut novel No Birds Sing is schedule for release by the end of the year from Alien Buddah Press. 



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