FARJOURNEY CARIBBEAN

                                                                                                                           

                                                       “My hand is full of lines
                                                        like your breast with veins, lady – ”
                                                – Martin Carter, Do Not Stare At Me  (1951)            

 

             Stylists of trust . with bread or brush, song or touch  
             claim it’s our best interest to refuse the manicure
             on trigger fingers | Boarding chime : Mr. Bludbliss? Yay.
             Duk Luk? Nay.

             Every sumptuous carpet^welcome on TV sets 
             the blood racing; those fabrics dasheen clean, who
             chalked them ? like my uncle’s funeral jacket do 
             they crease easy.

              \ Since we won’t be together forever Don’t touch
             me! we should consider what our close shavings
             tea leaf^like tell.
                                             My seamstress Aunt tethers
             end^run lines > spent souls who knot ‘n’ close heart
             shell script turning screw.

                                                      ^

              \ No matter how far you range globe beams
             scan^find traces | aliens with planet weaves never caught
             coupling in our mangrove lay low.
                                                             Hoist towers we copy 
             after speechless years cane leveling | load to shed
             bone idle, bottoms feed tax strokes. 

             Contractors of belief swear floor^knees with licks
             of prayer top finger beads any day . wan’to try?
             Roman nails for wrist (son crossed) could sell again,
             sooner than the end to ice shelf melt . wan’to see?

                                                                         – W.W.

                                                      

           

             

               PEDRO PERDIDO

               …………….
                                                                    … all is not perdido
               despite the keybored killer’s already stale insistence,
               not when there’s such a lovely shape of rhythm now moving
               towards you with a bounce in her step and wings to her hips
               not with the late sun-bow sprung off the edge of the mirror
               beside your table and falling across the page of words
               by which you are again trying to escape a whole world
               of Table Mirror Don’t Blame Meyou Thank You May I Have
               Please Thank You Very Much That Was One Made Popular By.

               ………………………………………

                  (from “The Gift Of Screws” by Brian Chan, 2008)

 

 

 

          
       But slowly Radica’s final no-argument word ‘sucks’
       – with all its dismissive mindlessness rooted in mere Taste,
       that fashion of Correctness wallpapering her café – 
       somehow crossed the moat of my detachment, only to sink
       like a sack of sand through the quicksand of my consciousness

       When her sack at last reached the bottom of my mind’s morass,
       all the tightly locked grains of silt whose sleep it had disturbed
       grabbed their chance to escape sleep’s final configuration
       and surged like lava upwards through the burst veins of my calm
       (so-called and so on) and i jumped to my feet, i stood up,
       looking down at Mona looking down on me from below:
       our appointment/disappointment bulged to a boil of pus
       to burst in a whore-house between a whore-man – who has searched
       a hundred houses, none of which housed his ideal twin whore –
       and a madame who couldn’t care what the ideal might be

                                                   *  

       So could there be ‘a deal’, finally?    Why had i stood up?
       I don’t know why, but i believe i saw ‘once and for all’,
       that i had failed with my moat and quicksand and castle-keep,
       failed Life itself, not ‘life’ locked between ironic quote-marks
       to shield me from breath’s gormless disappointing miracles.

       Beside her godwoman’s ironic fire, Mona seemed mere,
       and that’s what (to offer a mirage of ‘resolution’,
       in truth only a fading of the lights behind the scri’m)
       made me say to her in my learnt bland Canadian way
       – Have a nice life –   and turn and walk out of and away from
       Mona’s café, bonsai link in Ratsmoolahs’ hothouse chain

                               BLACKOUT

(from “fatima solagua arterra’s nudes”, a verse novel by Brian Chan, 2015)

  

     
      
        Straat brokers claim they can repair crash moments,
        stray cells on foreign mission; wipe Dutch stain
        clean off land ties. For hip^stiff anthems they wouldn’t
        stand; they don’t serve plates of soup.
                                                            Destinies could fade
        or after centuries show up . along canals, shelf clouds
        unattended; B Plan jungle^backed.

                                                *

        On the road one evening the dashboard track starts
        up . bumps goose flutter on the skin | the car lifts
        off the launch^pad grid, rump drempels.
                                                                   Weightless so
        this non-side choosing disc, its world^body parts
        faceted to fit . other people, heart rate.

                                                * 

        Sranan tong pacts reached with the past ? made
        Of What to last, you ask | + risk missing the turn off
        down unmappable cane paths, cattle nibbling.
                                                             No need to channel
        Rotterdam | Paramaribo unbranded . the egret^like
        shore solitude, step^pause flights . da da dahdah
        tokens Love^Only accepted, Ok?
                                                               – W.W.

         

       

 

 

 

            THE RIGHT TO COPY
            THE KNOWN AND THE UNKNOWN 

            If you hear a song you know but cannot tell   
            who, by the voice or style, the singing spirit
            serving by stretching the song is, you have yet
            to hear the one song you will hear at your death
            with ears of a bird-man born to migrate
            to tribes whose tongues feed, beyond speech, his own roots
            every time he listens to ‘foreign’ music
            sees a movie beyond colonist gestures,
            bathes in cinema of uncolonised light:
            no tourist ‘local colour’ in his soul’s zones
            of recognitions.

             …………………………….
                                                           …..……………………..

                (from “Readiness” by Brian Chan, 2013)

     

     
          
          *  Out of profane gas who knows how the straw head 
          catches; the world’s dry spells extend; the sun pokes
          peak signs through the weeds | straps cool down love
          stored in heat containers . cherry pick^use so.

                                                            / You lucky, you have   
          a man ! that Service Station manager man, gold ring
          fingers | turn 17 . from make believe Hey, mind
          my likes! Sankar bare lash me frighten.

                                                     / Shelf^happy keep 
          life shouldn’t be a thing | worst that could happen
          you far off the main road, house beetle^like testing
          blades of grass . cave whispers out of wind.

                                             ^

          *  Signed in keyless church ignition our forest
          priest navigating native nipples prays . souls turn
          blind eye like . up the creek . faith yielding
          while he eats.

          + This plantation yard match stumbles on a sweet
          stick | gasps But where to plug this ? this modern
          hacking tool that graters scorn of darker kin + how
          to peel pineapple skin.
                                                Who there ? price^smart
          curating looks . net blind tossing navel hook reap so 
          what coming coming ¿ who dying to know.

                                                                           – W.W.

 

 

         

 

             INFINITIVES

              …to know no difference between
                  North and South Americas or
              hemispheres, no ocean or mind
              between the Eastern earthworm’s owl
              and the Western magpie’s phoenix,
              and to praise both the turtle’s speed
              and the peacock’s blurred scrawl of sleep

                  In one thread of white hair stranded
              in a jungle of words also
              strayed off a head slowly losing
              all of its accustomed allies,
              to find a narrow path back home
              in the Sun’s dark centre where doubt
              staggers all fates, serving them so

             (from “Readiness” by Brian Chan, 2013)

 

   
    
      I was already regretting i used to laugh at love 
      When both Mia and, later, my wife would beg me not to,
      For here i was now looking at love’s vengeful painted lips
      Laughing at me in my new-sprung loneliness as i failed
      To make their mouth stop huh-huh-ing and smile with some shadow
      Of innocence.

      Now Radica shrugged off my attempts to understand her
      Unlikely relationship with Stew:  how did they ever?
    – No reason, Doctor Chattergoon, she purred, we fell, just fell.

                                                                       *

      Fall and fade like lovers and the words they live by and in.
      But what a pity to give up those words, like apartments,
      And let the realities they house fade from awareness,
      For words aren’t abstractions, but actions, breathing entities
      Linked with one another in a wide dance of utterance,
      And every word sounded, even if through forced or false pulse,
      Translates and transports every other dancer in the chain.
      Now with Mona on her latest plateau of suicide
      By Common Sense, i was afraid to speak some same-old words
      To tag and qualify persons and moments as discrete
      Things, yet I needed ‘things’ between us to be precisely
      Named, but with fresh words that would engender a whole new chain
      Of dancing changes by which we might celebrate our breath.

      Just as i was about to choose to fool myself again
      that companionship towards transcendence’s grail was yet
      possible, the lone queen Mona in irritation sighed
    – Bloody hell! Turn that shitty CD off!   That singer sucks! –
      and i knew at once, at last, that ‘Radica’ was, as much
      as ‘Mona’, one more delusory construct.

      (from “fatima solagua arterra’s nudes” by Brian Chan)

 

 

                                     

                                      “A body like you must learn to follow the shadow
                                        of an ant through the needle's eye of duty.” 
                                         – Wilson Harris, Heartland (1964)

            Fibres of integrity degrade; our ocean walls 
            could sigh ‘n’ crumble . scramble every toil^tiered
            towner deep inland, pulling straw ‘n’ bull.
                                                        Admin will swear next
            time . spine over riding posture | done! with bulb^like
            face hanging on shape^shift lines; spectacles of fabric
            sharing mind.

            Doctors till now dread trouble shooting Caliban
            criss^crassness | one ceramic chip whoa! check
            the dinner plates . cracks hiding; bamboo wrong fit,
            see our Cave Man Hosting Guide.

            Mass cells?  they tried tried^plant cure – pro^folk 
            who coming home assumed assumptions cared to play;
            whose arteries / margin to metroplex /  logged so
            who crop nurse need?

                                                  *

            Coastal roofs we rent ?  tenant customs undeclared :
            the heritage IV drip poles, grip^romance; Gao Ming
            store keepers flossing; our Station Supt. waving khaki
            hand gun applications.
                                                        \ iPhone vibrate, new
            message . fossil love cassava, purpose calculating.
            Not any time soon, G'wan ! crank yuh moves bad
            world gyurl.

                                                                – W.W.

 

             

             

 

                   ORACLE

                   If you feel this chart a blank slate,             
                   know that it has been prepared for us
                   to draw the moment of our mind on.

                   Should it seem a near-empty bowl,
                   know that it is designed not to leak
                   a single drop of your molten gold.

                   And if you find it floats in a free state,     
                   know that every border has been crossed
                   and every tribe challenged so that we might

                   begin to map our memory beyond
                   any nostalgia for one mother-
                   tongue or other investment of cowards. 
                 
                   …………………………….
                                                               ……………………..

               (from “The Gift of Screws” by Brian Chan, 2008)

 

 

  
          
            Fields planted up, out drained . work hands cup
            coin^like coordinates for paradise landings; breast
            vows that won't till^death main stay | Wait, who
            install you on my phone ? Jah Blesse, battery
            low . life fat consigning.
                                                         Corrugated for roof
            drip basin catch . till the next foetus kick pain
            bearers could erect^must block | thigh wary, swat
            aside blood wigglers underbiting.

                          / Or trade closet walls for an aircraft 
            hangar – file glider paths heron^like in space;
            give up the forest address, web spider wait for fire
            fanning mate. 
 

                                                ^

                    \ On second thought we hired Graciela, a start 
           over migrant . serve hostage from los polvos days
           bra ‘n’ panty parceling.
                                                Paid to polish shoes, our
           feet now shod; sweep around the sand pile fortress
           plan . pass^fail tempers warming with the years;
           the gods we pay ! topology of dice sustaining.

           Stuck in lymbostasis rules in extremis swing;
           our searchers strike . shovel^like validating trust
           in mortem metallum.
                                             Hair lines cross thread,
           beard head coverage end | bend tekking Happy
           now? so rivers flow; neighbours watching.

                                                                        -W.W.

 

 

           
              
                                 [ In mem.  Fernando Botero . 1932 – 2023 ]    

           BUD MOLSON'S WHITE DUNCE CAP

 

           But feathers facing winds of prairies or peaks are soon 
           blown off, as pebbles (or Injuns) in (poisoned) downstreams
           are washed away.   Molson’s majority of cowards,
           of beaten and beating-up buddies and dogs and guns,

           can erase you in any back-alley of your choice,
           not so much for your look but your voice, the sounds you make
           which slot you fast as one more Klaatu from outer space,
           an uncalled-for nuisance to that final product, life

           ………………………………….
                                                           ………………………….

                  (from “Readiness” by Brian Chan, 2013)

                                

                 Just as i, scaling my seventieth year's peak, wanted
          That woman, that bursting Radica, that princess turned queen-
          Mother, that legendary near-mythical Queen Mona,
          what i now don’t want is to serve you, reader, one more dish
          Of guys looking at chicks (which mon semblable Godard proposed
          As one reading of flics – and, no doubt, of much Western art –
          Another being his unconsolingly catholic
          Death in action – the kind of unflinching clarté the French
          – Qui d’autres?, absolument, leur terroir va sans dire, sans doute –
          Excel in)

          My invaluable ‘sphinx without a secret’;   my dime-
          a-dozen muse:   i found her beauty as impossible
          To bear as its power-mode must have been for her colleagues.
          How had Stew undermined and overcome that explosive
          Hurdle – in himself?     Could this old man, no Woody Allen,
          Hope to cope?    Not a hope in hell.

                                             *

             You may say that all i am saying is that, at my age,
          Passion and vision should meet as cousins kissing only,
          Each too retardedly delusional to risk spawning
          That most moronic oxymoron, passionate vision.

          Yet hope :   four-letter word.   With which others did i convince
          Radica to come with me for coffee?   – at Ratsmoolahs,
          The nearby ‘Ethiopian’ café –  Oh, she laughed, one
          Of mine!   Favourites or properties? i joked.   Both of course!

           (from “fatima solagua arterra’s nudes” by Brian Chan)

 

 

 

                                                                          
                                            “To be the child of wretched ambition …of desired
                                              greatness, the child of paradise, hell.”
                                                       Wilson Harris, Companions of the Day
                                                                             and Night” (1975)

 

                 Measured by traders in the chamber deadly
                 so . any spark could trigger panic chutes as out
                 of reach squeeze gaps appear | manners we deserve,
                 the blinds we’d recurve . Look at us now!   

                 Here's a prospector's lunch splash I have crossed so
                 many rivers cutting up his meat; his paddle blade on tax
                 holiday – felling trees; mineral pit composting
                 earth like sacrifice after the hunt.

                 There’s a Starbucks in our City Mall; escalator
                 up from roadside hang stalls housing others | sip;
                 cradle each moustache cup, pot luck steaming
                 like from teeth ‘n’ nail care; pesticide alert
                 mute.

                                                    ^  

                 Test the island line extensions – from our Naipaul’s
                 Negros, “hair done in little pigtails, a Medusa
                 head” | not root threatening, though fear from all
                 reports like asphalt wavy in the heat.

                                                             How Hardutt ramps          
                  Yuh muddah cunt! Who you think U R?  marks
                  plantation carrier, latter day device; chest wall
                  safe ‘n’ wells performing | home land pending.

                                                                               – W.W.

 

             

               

               

 

               I SAY

               A man does not talk out of the back of his head, 
               and true books are not birthed from frightened shadows’ wombs
               nor out of the cracks in the cliff-climbing of past
               tyrants whose hungry ghosts demand they be filled in,
               but from ‘a feeling about the world which creates
               a need that nothing satisfies’ except essays
               at ‘the final poem of fact in the language
               of fact not realised before’, of an Ireland,
               say, that, green as it is, grows ‘greener than it is’
               - for unwittingly containing green Guianas
               as well as they always bore their own green Others.

               …………………………….
                                                         ……………………..

                    (from “Readiness” by Brian Chan, 2013)

               
                                          
                                                      

 

              
            Spiders gave up on webs long after the assumption,
            Anansi #1 silk trade suspect . like vagina helpers
            home accounts can’t completely ignore; or text
            rich in tell^tale idiot sounding fury.

               * Straighteners face pale notice – l’horreur! for 
            this you’ve fallen ? the oldest civilization in the look;
            hair braided in forest virtue, connectivity.

                    \ Saint Coitus silent, snap decisions could leave 
            flesh grid^like . lady days, night duress. There are
            blue^chipping options bailar bailar!  

                                                         ~ | ~

            Last stand on earth^like mothers post how cleft
         + groin show care – deer spiral antler^like on point
            along faith inbreeding paths, lizard throat puff
            watch.

                 * The unthinkable pressing up against     
            heart timid at goodbyes . from veil^sash ties
            the dragon loose > curving flame strike vows
            make clear of pain.

                        \ How right they were : our desert fevers      
            too late time relieves; death so gentle thanks
            one ‘n’ all for coming | rest assured . cape
            wraps swirl Olé! life^stops to heal. 

                                                                 – W.W.

       

 

             

       
                    THE NEWEST TESTAMENT DUE

 
                    Yes, extract the fine from the gross, but
                    refinement is no funeral-flag.
               There can be too much of even Less
               Is-More:  look, your belly is bulging from it.
               Reduction, renunciation, sacrifice:
               these are addictive hooks that can shred your veins

                    if you’re in love more with the idea 
                    of Death than with making more life-space
             - by throwing out dead forms, and letting more seeds
               into life’s womb.

                  ………………………
                                            ………………………………….

                   (from “Readiness” by Brian Chan, 2013)