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        One roof as slant as the next ? attempt fail here, shelter
        there; pipe limers from foreign drill minding our own
        business | breach . that stage again.

        Paid up his wife took the child, arguing she had a fine    
        place back there / in that freaking rain all the time seagull
        country, Yes / gave it up . grass here dry so.

        Bus queue Might I ask good egg ?  yuh boy in London   
        lonely | in Port of Spain homely. They had a gardener
        but yuh girl was no Chatterley . tight What am I doing
        here Sargassum spread.

        Her starapple twilight gaze . read vaccine blocking nest   
        infection | though one henna Savi half his age kept angling
        round . moist, in test match readiness.
                                                           Jumping crapaud! what
        you expect . the currency of green river days ?  two
        fold bake fish ‘n’ chipping.
                                                    ~

                                                *Jook all you want . about island               
        love > a wrench to open ends a tail wind wretch would
        wheel from.  
                                   Heavens ground, curve simple : him have
        him house, she missed her rain . left him the fuck! right
        there.                                           

                       *Paratha does clap hot skin flake so, all the rook
        cooks gone a world . flipping method, still can’t castle.
                                                                               And before
        long pure scratch you hear . Build something nah, from
        bass again.
                                                            – W.W.

 

           

           

 

 

          CHARON

          So gullible but perverse Charon now tells Sistuh
            Mo (she should have been a nun): Tanks fuh nuttn,
           Feeling self-pityingly already dead,
           And slams down the hotel-phone’s red receiver.

         *OF ALL the women he could have married, why
          Had he given in to that born-again fright?
          Her other ambition had been Canada
        Where (she thanked The Lord and he Bejesus) they could get
          Divorced without the whole blinkin world having
         To tawk about it:  in Canada, who cares
          If or how you get (or get to be) an ex?

            (from “Charon’s Anchors” by Brian Chan)  

                                                                 
                         

 

           
        Well, i imagine that's why Lee laughed, through her gasping, at
        Stew's super-heroine, Frenchy Duelle flashing her chatte
        While rescuing innocents who still bore their baby-fat.
        Lee’s laughter felt harsh, but she was superstitiously not
        A mocker of other people’s dreams:  she’d just been too hot
        In her moment to take his fantasy-world seriously

                                                 ~

        But, to tell the truth, there were fantasies ‘out there’ a lot
        Hotter than the pap Stew was then pitching her.   Chinese Lee
        Herself had dreamt up ‘Mija’, a real shero, a bitch-‘ho’,
        A Korean karate-kicking lesbian with no
        Compunction about correcting and healing men brutish
        Towards girls, by carving and serving them up like fish

                                                 *

        Stew's pink blonde doll seemed a mere statue on top of a tomb,
        Compared to Lee’s kickin red-haired Yellow mama for whom
        The word ‘impossible’ was not a ‘viable option’
        (Even the sharpest people don’t avoid the adoption
        Of, and corruption by, the dullest shibbolethic shells).

                                                 ~

          When, after sex, Lee told Stew what she thought of his Duelle,
       And began to babble about the ‘powers’ of her own
       Mija as an angry bitch eager for a bloody bone,
       Stew pushed her out of his bed, fucking her off into hell,
       And consoled himself with the fierceness of his hatred of
       That other whore, Queen Mona, easier to loathe than love,
       Although, and because, a mere word from her made him splutter
       And get his testes atingle and his heart aflutter

        (*fatima solagua arterra’s nudes* by Brian Chan, 2015)

 

 

 

               
          Blasted from homes they carry . the worst of it, forced
          to flee sans humanité suitcase like in old world wars;
          hoping cloth layers keep dock walls dry, betray no hint
          what fears in ‘n’ under weary mount.

                                                                             For once
          the coconut palms start slanting, sites go amiss; the frog
          throat pays no mind; on swallow point charter teeth halt
          grinding . turn about.
                                                         Trust a must the change
          bill man; boat triers hate watching his web fingers
          count / his paradise long list / your water breaking despite
          how capped pain waves appear.

                                                        ~

                                 Forest, desert stake the make do maison       
          d’être / rest coughing up, in tent bed pests / languish so
          sand literal poker hands peek anxious to call . deep
          craw flushers just standing there.

                                 *As camp fires face lick . scarvers    
          rifle . marbles spray the sky | bride helper, head left
          right sweeping up the casings, welcome to the feast
          (the program whispers).
                                        So say the veil unhooks, combs toss
          (why not) at beard groom vulvarines around the pledge.  

           No, your mother won’t stop crying | Yes, and tether the cow;  
          (at least configure, fret) grass nights on four, the belly
           role ballooning.

                                                                      – W.W.

             

                 

             

 

            
            QAT
                     

            *IN DOUALA (where she'd learnt shit meant also
             Ab$tract dollar$), Qat used to to chant Christian Rap
             In cafés and markets, and still conjures up
           A good-Old Testamental retribution-picture
             If you get her good-and-pissed, outraging her
             Sense of decency and l’il faut de Justice:
             Pour tel, elle se connait votre moyenne, mais

             *TO OTHERS, she beams an 'exceptional light'
              (Her boss’s term for her ‘performance-presence’)
              Of hope to the puzzled polymorphs she has
            To lead through the purgatory

               (from “Charon’s Anchors” by Brian Chan)  

       

 

                                                                                        
                                                                     
                                                                    "..tryin to mek sense
                                                              of all de wallawallawalla" 
                                                                    – Kamau Brathwaite, "Kumina"   

          
         The brain to swish pain on any limb / random, close / should 
         send strokers into island forests where debts 'n' nature
         dance to tune : head in a bag full of bees. 
                                                      The hands to drive car fast way
         lay soft rounding bends; bicycle lane where frame ‘n’ grass
         collection loose Oh Shit! in green red fly.

                          Not so good heaven folk next door knock asking     
         help securing heart transplant; it breaks step up . island
         bottoms, hip permits like for tippy toe ballet.

         All zinc fenced out, gun bwoy barbare | monde guango see    
         tek wing, grade skin fi suck . nice stranger recognize.
                                                     A breadth of version they’re held
         responsible for by prunes at gossip meets; by flower stalkers
         hunched over microscope | ovules warm Oh boy, watch
         trouble nah.

         Whose will lifts crow song bars for ‘ours before’ ? ocean
         cross ties | ash tomb fight, two stick tight. 
     
                                                                 Grille world . enough
         to go around, head home; probe done with sun belt, cold
         snap . shots of breast in vest, best for market over weight
         vendors – Excuse me? – minivan now boarding.

                                                 Centuries through cane, sacred
         savings . ‘Tessa  ello!...ello!’           

                                                                                            – W.W.

 

 

                              

                   

 

 

 

               BRICOLAGE

               He had clichés galore to live up to and live down,
               And was eager, as an in-White Englishman,
               To be seen not wanting to be seen as White,
               Thereby ending up being ignored as one.

               Only poor students, not yet schooled in lying
               Through their teeth to stay balanced on ambition’s
               Ladder entertained the ex-Cockney for his
            ‘Honesty’, for the very innocence that made him
               Open his mouth to let his story jump out
               Like an enthusiastic frog, warts and all.
               His only ambition it seemed was to play –

               With words, ideas and those academic banes,
               Feelings and their utterances

                (from “Charon’s Anchors” by Brian Chan) 

 

                                                     -                                                                               

 

             But does stubborn addiction stop there?   Why, the very air,
        Polluted or clean, in the garden hooks us with fear
        Of its running out, no matter how old or young we are,
        Whether we’re running on automatic shallow breaths, or
        Sitting in a yoga-pose, slowly becoming aware
        Of breath as widest fire

                                                ~

                                                                  Thus we're corrupted
        By our addiction to the garden’s purest atmosphere
        – A bald hairy notion someone choking to death would hear
        As immoral, evil and cruel, hypocritical
        Casuistical shite only scribes ‘metaphysical’
        Would dare utter in the face of a world of people with
        Harder and therefore better things to think about

                                                *

             I used to counsel one such pretentious ambitious tyke,
        ‘Stewart’, in APT’s D&G’s team.   He had taken a dislike
         To the very idea of the super-bitch Radica
         Astronomo-Kanamono, APT’s rich astonisher.

         To astonish her was Stewart’s obsession – one of many:
         Another was his comicbook-figure, Bedwet Benny;
         Yet another, Duelle – who’d fly around, without any
         Clothes on, over and through the streets of an ever-unnamed
         Metropolis, swooping down to rescue boys and girls blamed
         For crimes they had not (yet) committed, only considered

                                              ~

           She was the seed of a graphicnovel that had withered
         (But not quite shrunk) when Asian one-night-stand Lee laughed at it
         Or at how Stew told it as she was plucking at her clit
         To finish off what he had just failed to and had no qualm
         About, the selfish white-boy shit, what was wrong with these damn
         Little friggin boys?   Pretending to be grown men was what

             (*fatima solagua arterra’s nudes* by Brian Chan, 2015)

 

 

 

 

                                                   "..the insane clatter of silk as it fell
                                    to the floor; stocking; manuscript or flesh"
                                          – Wilson Harris, "The Waiting Room"

                 
                                                                                          Evie on                         
              Mondays wears something he might have liked, his office
              rituals missed | the waist knot tug . hand to skin spark
              find, slit ‘n’ tight fit needling.
                                                                  If others prefer shape
              shifts, coffee with cognac ~ fine! ~ fireflies can afford
              to be moody; hang on one second.

              Out on the ocean, mainsail limp . who would refuse a wind    
              brisk trader; the brush stroke horizon line so you could leap
              dolphin like to shore.
                                               Bad endings clog canals . oars parting        
              the past hard as belt marks on back.

              Harder still, the faith keep . counting breath like on virus          
              wards | don’t act PhD dick heady, Nothing to do with me,
              oyster du jour.

              Week earning end, Evie’s train all heart ‘n’ arteries              
              into funnels form top Godspeed out.
                                                                      No vein tap midnight
              rush, flowers to vase complete | undress, unwrap
              insert prints spirited off ring fingers; slide valves
              heat ~ up burn pilots flare.
                                                             - W.W.

                              

                 

                 

 

             

              MARA 

              So why now her fond smile in his memory?
              She used to jokingly call him mon semblable,
              Mon frère, but now realizes that was more

              Than third-hand sub-literary smartness but
              A real recognition of Lessing as hers,
              Belonging to her as her elemental
            Hubris, her living shadow she was bound to crash through
              And later value like the welts on her skin:
              Lessing, her guy that got away, is the one
              Blind man who has led her across death’s traffic.

             
              (from “Charon’s Anchors” by Brian Chan) 

 

 

          

       Scream – not just for the next jug:   the hard-rock snarls are so loud
       You need to scream – your plight of which the pub’s owners are proud,
       Since it is the direct result of their having obeyed
       Their marketing expert’s instructions on how to persuade
       After-work drinkers to buy more beer than they really need:
       'Keep battering their eardrums, till their eyeballs almost bleed'

                                                ~

 

       All the crap you had to put up with all week long and will
       Have to again, starting Monday morning, and you could kill
       Yourself for not quitting, perhaps you’re just a masochist
       Fooling yourself you’re a saint or a hard-nosed realist,
       Don’t most people take comfort from routine torture, take pride
       In any job well done?

                                                *

       
           Yup, there's a cheap halo hovering over drudgery
        – Including, no doubt, scribbling lines of so-called poetry,
        Long-winded lines of words dragging their wings, like drunken bees
        Bloated with some bitter nectar;   or words like famished fleas
        That can’t yet convince themselves to feed off Litricher’s bitch,
        Like proper addicts of her blood.

                                                ~

                                                          But there's the rub, the itch,
        Of the needle and the needing more, the groove none escapes,
        Streak of the human spirit’s need to stray, beyond an ape’s
        Ambling, rambling contentedness (which even apes will flout)
        Into fields of painful experiment, eurekas, doubt
        – All the shape-shifting tricks that sooner or later harden
        Into habits

           (*fatima solagua arterra’s nudes* by Brian Chan, 2015)

 

                                                                       
                                                                ".. touch and go like fish to bait, flame to match
                                                                  .. in and beyond the life of leviathan, half machine,
                                                                      half human"   
                                                                                        – Wilson Harris, "Heartland"

                                                                                           Soon iris 
        scanners will determine play fold disposition; bright jagged
        lines that blear in sea rooms of consent – skin cells faking;
        the plateau, on your own.

        Gay switched cylinders with gusto though by next half    
        century the word around curves could gentrify | transient
        ‘Who was that?’ bagged for street sanitation bins.

         Too ‘intensely civilized’ to leave office, few statesmen would   
         concede; upload stream in the cubicle ? what down leg
         trickle issues.
                  Bit parts linger, strain hard to pass; bent on outlasting   
         bankers pat the bedpan, pay to beat the gong.

                                         With heart cubes shaping clicks through
         world ends, trust deep . bio rhythms to jig jiggy paradise
         stuck keys; moonlight break, babies make / unfinished
         children muttering / latch the gate. 

         OmyGod high . we’ll chuckle at what in classic years         
         mattered; what passed for change : air curtain calls . hooks
         you know, like ‘Well done. Now how about some dancing,
         Comrades?’

                                                                                        – W.W.

 

           

                 

 

 

          MARA

          Her screamings may have been sordid and seedy,
          As vulgar as Mara would learn to hate them,
          But Mommy’s fear of abandonment had been
        As real as her sense of Mara’s betrayal of her
          By just thinking of wanting to go beyond
          The walls of the marriage cage Mommy had felt
          She must accept to give her daughter a name.

          And Mara’s mother’s abuses were far less
          Seedy than her father’s fawnings ended up
          Being one night when, helping him into bed
        Drunk, Mara had knelt to his too-much, in the spirit
         Of experimental vengeance, spite against
         Her mother’s demandingly stifling limits,
         And to taste, know the seeds of her mother’s shame.

            (from “Charon’s Anchors” by Brian Chan)

 

 

 

         

          At one point, to feel socially energized in the Caribbean, it mattered if
          you were young and alive in Kingston, Jamaica in the 1970s, and you
          were hearing for the first time the street hailing sound of U Roy.

          Since his death, words of tribute have rippled across media pages. For
          many there was a special resonance in his voice. It was like nothing you’d
          heard before.

          Islanders in the 60s were more at ease with the Byron Lee Dragonaire
          sound. His sun-enjoying beats accommodated a need for pleasant nights
          out dancing, on hotel floors or at island nightclubs.

          Came the 70s, and a range of performance to choose from: a catch fired
          Bob Marley jamming, his appeals for crossAtlantic justice. Songs of love
          and wanting from sweet melodians (Gregory Isaacs, Phyllis Dillon).
          Straight dance party favourites, or those home galloping Rastafari drums.

          In the mix U Roy appeared and immediately it struck you: this guy was
          bold and streaking. His improvising style was not the very first of its kind,
          but original he was all the same.

          The voice overlays, the out of line affirmations – here was someone
          rising above reggae’s bass ruling manners, interrupting the call for  
          pure entertainment – “Wake the Town and tell the people, ‘bout the
          musical disc coming your way” – challenging air play predictableness
          like never before.

                     

                             

          Back then he was simply U Roy, his birth name obscure to outsiders. His
          ‘toasting’ style would find inheritors (Big Youth, Yellow Man) but nothing
          compares with discovering those U Roy 45s; with being there, eager to
          be invigorated.

          At times his ‘words of wisdom’ in and alongside popular songs came
          across as almost ‘rude’ attachments. He had something to say; he wanted
          the whole world to hear what he (not Ken Boothe, not Jimmy Cliff)
          understood about the Kingston tough life / hard love experience.

          He seemed to suggest there was nothing fate binding about anyone’s
          birth or circumstance. You could bike ride through Kingston’s top | bottom
          grading streets; or stand aside and look. Or with a little hop and scat you
          could remodel the wheel, refashion the world with ‘versions galore’.

          If you were lucky to be in Jamaica in the 1970s, the U Roy sound, tossing
          live words into streams of complacency, was like nothing that came
          before.

          With rap imitators doing celebrity laps now everywhere, generations
          late may wonder: does the man deserve a Caribbean halo? remembered
          as an island music ‘originator’?  Yeah yeah yeeeah! As he would say.

                                                                          – Wyck Williams

              

 

    

                                                                        "Can't be others till there's one"
                                                                                    – Cave painting title                 

            Here's to what gives work rest swing / the scythe right 
            Sorry left . sigh / messáging sun beds; Monday fast break
            eggs that crackle after . which the whisk nude shells
            inform.

            Soon enough, concrete still wet, new customs set : take   
            the trail not the elevator, check crab traps when not
            on line; card rafted, rip that shark head clean off
            plastic wall indifference.

            Sky glass towers get built for souls whose agents fruited           
            trees / in frontmanship, confessions missed / balls
            at their feet courting targets any flower of day . skip
            crystal gazing.

                                                                        Bone mass non
            stoppers, c’ést sûr . considering how primate torsos pulled
            upright; whose fauna ovens fatuus lit got worked over
            centuries of blood . speckled flora; snake squeezing,
            ease.

                                                               *In fields of fission tangled since      
            core cells squirt . stream into valley, world in the palm.
                           *And gun flag braiders jangle so, ankle
            bracelets swell ‘n’ heat ! you never know with these
            summit hikers | fucking neanderthals . back and forth
            with stories.

                                                               – W.W.

 

           

                 

                                        

 

                QAT 

             While fussing over her needy types, her damned
             Immigrants and blessèd refugees.  *HERSELF
             As shiny-black ‘as a fly in buttermilk’,
           And capable of uttering in several tongues,
             Qat had been chosen to work at Refugrants,
             First as one of its non-threatening counter-
             Clerks, then fast promoted to work at a desk.

             It wasn't just her good luck to have been hired
             By a Dutchman, Jewish-White (however red
             His neck), who happens to have a thing for all
           Gals Black (however pink their palms), especially when
             They are nonchalantly great-looking and smart.

               (from “Charon’s Anchors” by Brian Chan)