Remedios Varo, "La maquina del sueno"

Icy flakes drift and float

From every fold of her cloak. 

Layers of fabric billow and drape

Around her in an amoebic shape.

Her headdress rises slim and sleek, 

Climbing skyward to an alpine peak. 

Her ghostly fingers emerge slow and grave, 

Like jellyfish flowing from an ocean cave.

How many prey has she caught in her net?

How long has she kept the moon as her pet?

Where did she harvest the pearls on her vest?

Why do her eyes drift mournfully west?

These and more questions we never can answer, 

No matter how nicely or sweetly we ask her. 

There’s no one more famous in the sea for shyness

Than Her Misty Majesty, Our Royal Highness.

2 Postcard Poems

 

            Three gentlemen at the bookstore, 
            What do you think they look for?
            Maybe a guide
            On how to decide
            Which kind of hat suits them more.

                Library After Air Raid, London, 1940

                Archive of the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England

            Do you think it too early to dine? 
            That cabbage looks truly divine.
            Perhaps just a nibble--
            I'd rather have kibble!
            Oh, I suppose for a dog that's just fine.

                    Tortoise with a Difference, 1960

                    John Drysdale

"Good Bones"

Maggie Smith

Life is short, thought I keep this from my children. 

Life is short, and I've shortened mine

in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways, 

a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways

I'll keep from my children. The world is at least

fifty percent terrible, and that's a conservative 

estimate, though I keep this from my children. 

For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird. 

For every loved child, a child broken, bagged, 

sunk in a lake. Life is short and the world 

is at least half terrible, and for every kind 

strange, there is one who would break you, 

though I keep this from my children. I am trying

to sell them the world. Any decent realtor, 

walking you through a real shithole, chirps on 

about good bones: This place could be beautiful, 

right? You could make this place beautiful. 

Neighbourhood blooms | June