Kant – picky sod,
Schopenhauer – miserable sod,
Rousseau – liberal sod,
Hegel? Liminal sod.
Voltaire – sarcy sod,
Heidegger – silly sod!
Nietzsche – creepy sod,
Camus? Poor sod.
A Layman’s Guide to European Philosophy
Tag: Poetry
Positano Poemas
‘Bronze-breasted women’
Bronze-breasted women
gazing at crystals,
in Positano shop windows.
And, in the vines
entwined overhead,
blue butterflies,
warming their wings
in the boiling
morning sun.
‘A swallowtail fell’
A swallowtail fell
onto the terrace,
a banknote,
slipping through the railings.
‘In the night’
In the night the forest
burned, a clutch
of smoking orange groves.
By morning
helicopters ran drills
from the sea to the sky,
pouring fish
and blue water,
into the flames.
Redwing
The night sky,
and calling
redwing crossing
the blue depths,
from black oak
to black oak.
© Daniel James Greenwood 2011
In the Russian Wood
I searched through the trees
in the Russian wood.
The bullish wren,
reciting from the brush.
The towers loomed
in the pale morning
air, spring waking
slowly in the green lawns,
and the chaffinch
showing in the elder.
He was soon to sing.
A Chinese woman threw
a ball to her baby boy,
he motored
after the rainbow-coloured
thing. His grandmother
floated in their wake,
the gentle manoeuvres
of a knowing,
loving mother to more
than her first,
and foremost.
© Daniel James Greenwood 2011
Fallen Beech
A fallen beech,
like the limb
of a prostrate,
fallen beast.
© Daniel James Greenwood 2011
The Dripping Park
The dripping park:
black and sodden cotton,
the brink of dark,
exultant, the dripping park.
I am speaking Russian –
‘Meenya zavoot Danila!’
and you are overawed like a child.
You reply fluently so I stop.
You move beneath a pink umbrella,
and in the near night I miss you.
The rain meets your curls,
your white cotton.
The dripping park:
black trees and shivering ponds.
Cars are fizzing on the outside.
You step into a hidden pool,
taking a tissue from your bag
you wipe your ankle down,
your hair lurches over as you bend.
We are on the brink, the break of dark.
The lanterns lull.
We are leaving…
on cracked and caving paving.
© Daniel James Greenwood 2011
Like Starlings
I am like a starling,
I mimic people passing,
and craning from the roof,
I whistle a little tune.
We are just like starlings,
with iridescent markings,
we gather on the roof,
we play our little flutes.
I am but a starling,
I call to people passing,
and perched up on the weathervane,
I play my little flute.
We are all like starlings,
we sing to people passing,
our bodies made for dancing,
we sing our little tunes.
© Daniel James Greenwood 2011
If I am not in love
If I am not in love
I can be found,
tearing pages from children’s colouring books,
letting them into the dock.
If I am not in love
I can be found,
mugging schoolboys
for their headphones.
If I am not in love
I can be found,
sinking rowboats
in Regent’s Park.
If I am not in love
I can be heard,
speeding past your house
blaring funky house.
If I am not in love
I can be found,
burning plastic figurines
in midday alleyways.
If I am not in love
I have been known
to throw stones, at the windows
of the Sefton Palm House.
If I am not in love
I can be found,
pouring thick black oil
into my sleeping neighbour’s pond.
If I am not in love
I can be found,
belching in the cosmetics aisle
of a monolithic supermarket.
If I am not in love
I can be seen,
picking my nose and sat at this desk
by my bedroom window.
© Daniel James Greenwood, 2010
Unlocking Landscapes 