Patrick White Poems

Summer triangle through the leaf cover
of the birches and pines, Deneb, Al Tair, Vega,
a swan, an eagle, and a lyre, and the sun
headed toward Vega at l8 km/sec. Arcturus
...

Not interested in the brand name of your audience.
Poetry makes its own up on the go, resonates
with the stars and the fireflies, mysteriously
marauds its own sacred shrines for the relics
...

Full moon and the mournful thunder of a train
passing through town. Venus, Jupiter, Mercury
long gone down for the rest of the night.
Orion a pale imitation of itself in the west.
...

Beauty in the aloofness of my usual sorrows.
A respite in time and care. A hole in space
I can escape through without setting off any alarms.
And I don't care what this poem is going to be about
...

The chaos of my unravelling self, a snake pit
of dissonant wavelengths that yesterday the moon
wove into a flying carpet, and then undid again.
Or maybe I jumped. I don't recall.
...

Drunk on nettle wine, alone, scalded by stars
that harass my sense of wonder like blackflies
with the atomic futilities of transformation,
the broken windows of their radiance,
...

Double full moons in the thermal panes across the street,
elaborate fractals of disproportionate replicates
in a seasick multiverse warped by the aging ripples of the glass.
I see Li Po drowning in all of them trying to embrace
...

Kisses instead of scars if you can manage it.
Love, not a science. Still an art. Though a dying one.
The discipline of staying a constant beginner.
As if the morning glory had never felt the light before.
...

Adolescent bridal spiders webbing the doorway
with laughter and tumescent sex,
waiting for the hilarious rain.
Waitresses with overly bleached hair
...

When the unsayable supplants yesterday's wisdom
it makes it look obvious and trivial in retrospect
and you marvel at the spiritual gestures of goodwill
that swept you off your feet for light-years
...