Monday, November 16, 2015

Neil Fulwood- Three Poems



Falkirk Wheel
  
On a clear day you can see half
of central Scotland, says the guide –
 
today it’s barely half an inch,
the hammerhead shape of the Wheel
 
a shower-curtain silhouette,
its centrifugal rotation
 
slow and silent, ghosted by fog,
as if rearing up from legend.
 
 
Anxiety Attack
 
Panic is always
close, a lurker in the wings
waiting for its cue;
 
easy to summon
as a waiter or taxi –
easier: panic
 
isn’t put out by
snapped fingers or terse gestures,
theatrical coughs.
 
Panic’s suave, well-groomed;
there for you before you’ve asked.
Dinner jacket, tie,
 
crisp white linen draped
on an arm set-square angled,
voice a dark murmur
 
traversing the nerves,
the veins, patterning itself
into the pauses
 
between breaths, heartbeats,
the steady tic of the pulse.
Panic’s in control
 
before you’ve even
reached for the first of the day.
Panic knows what’s best.



Part
 
     Just because you do not take an interest in politics
     does not mean politics will not take an interest in you.
     - PERICLES
 
     Es ist mein teil – nein!
     - RAMMSTEIN
 
 
My part was when I looked away.
My part was when my tongue ceased to function,
my conscience to even deserve the name.
 
My part: to embrace distraction.
My part: to sniff out and succumb to
the lure of the lowest common whatever.
 
My part was to allow things to happen.
My part was to sidestep involvement.
My part was to cultivate disinterest.
 
My part: complacency and freeview channels.
My part: I’m all right Jack, you know the rest.
My part: share or like if you couldn’t care less.
 
My part is a symphony in the key of nothing.
My part is a canvas by an underpainter.
My part’s what the delete key leaves behind.



Neil Fulwood was born in Nottingham in 1972 and has been keeping the city's pubs in business since 1990. His poetry has appeared in The Bitchin' Kitsch, Rat's Ass Review, Black Mirror Magazine, UFO Gigolo and Horror Sleaze Trash. He is the co-editor, with David Sillitoe of the anthology More Raw Material: work inspired by Alan Sillitoe (Lucifer Press, 2015).


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