Poetry by Luigi Coppola

Stair six spirals
down like a drill

you can stare up
the centre to see

others above
- reach the peak

and you can spit
on who you were

You don't notice
I'm carving
into the oak

or the pause to
think of what
to etch

You don't notice
my knife
and its beat

on the bark
the sound of symbols
or the sound

it makes when
it reaches sap

The boy of me loved squash
watered down to water

Later the frizz of cola
the can's spark

that opened later
to rotting apples

sugar and spirit
crushed barley then

finally to wine
sweet wine

I was a slow alchemist
a plodding, wannabe Jesus

A man walks into a forest
Takes a tree to the mill
The wood goes to the factory
The table goes to the shop
The shop sales the table to the man
The man takes the table to his house
The house has a tree in the garden
Each branch a pendulum in the wind and dust

I'm looking through the shop window
at the filled rows, glass boxes and walls.
Did I mention the smell? Was there one?
Yes, it was musk, warmth, dust, alcohol
infusing this high street zoo of frozen frames.
Trim and pimped on quiet pedestals-
from open field, wood, stream to shelved
herd, flock, shoal of distant cousins.

I'm staring at the cow head, its pert ears
pointless satellites, its nose a dried oyster
glued back on at slightly an off angle,
and its eyes, in their wide blackness
reflecting each blade, fence, muddied machine,
and that final hollowing out by prod, then pistol.

Not many people know this, but God played pool.
Back in the days before war and extinction
the animals and the stars would watch God
chalk the tip, stroke his cue, sink the black.

All were awed by Him, except for Monkey,
who would try but never beat Him.
Monkey would jump and shout, throw and break
when he lost, God’s humble smiles infuriating more.

On the sixth day they played again, God cleaning up from break.
Monkey jumped and shouted, threw and broke the cue -
God's heart, solid with trust, saw nothing, heard nothing.

Monkey smiled and spat and patted to hide it,
binding it together again with a black hair from his arse,
then handed it back to God and grunted “Re-match.”
He lifted the cue high, the blue of the sky now chalk.

The crowd, bodies and dust, watched as Monkey stood and God
broke, the cue snapped, splintered, shattered again
and cut with laws unto itself eternal hands.

The blood hit the white of the cue ball in tiny red snakes
as the sky’s blue chalk stamped its circle
branding the Monkey’s black hair
that had curled into a dot from shame.

And with a tear, from cut or betrayal no one knew,
God soaked the white ball, its red snakes,
its blue stamp, its black dot, as it rolled
into a pocket, into a socket.

As Monkey laughed, pissing and drinking,
the animals and stars went back to their shadows,
for they all knew God would never play again.

He threw the other balls into the cosmos.
He planted the broken wood into the ground,
rooting with forgotten rules. And he left the table,
pink from wear, to its own devices, blinking.

and I had to look away from that misty screen.

Scratching the tire track across my chest
I looked around the rest of the cloud
the others waiting in line were bored stiff
the angels were humming and giggling
and God was yawning.

Apparently, I wasn’t going to hell - hadn’t been naughty enough.
I wasn’t going to limbo, it was full, and now in heaven
it seemed that no one wanted me here.

I realised at that excruciatingly slow moment of revelation
that my life and I had been really, really boring.

I sat there thinking about all my special and unique
and good things and how I didn't feel I was any of those things.
The heavens must have been watching lives like mine
for infinity, just average, just normal, nothing special -
I imagined having to sit through an endless run of American
Based on a True Story made-for-TV films.

I turned my back to it all, too preoccupied
with my own life’s monotony to watch the movie of it.
But I couldn’t not hear, couldn’t get away
from that dull soundtrack.

I listened to the last few seconds -
a busy street, cars and people, horns and then a screech,
people screaming, a woman crying, then silence.
I turned to watch the final scene - a baby crawling
back into her mother's arms, then a fade to black.

I couldn’t remember what had happened,
but then I heard a choir of cheers and what looked like eyes
being wiped but staying wet. The others were all applauding
the angels patted me on the back, and among all the handshakes
I said to myself ‘I don’t understand’.

God put his hand upon my shoulder
He smelt clean, new, like a big bearded baby
and He said ‘Let me show you around.’

someone
goes somewhere
and meets someone else
and they do something – they fall in love
then they argue for some reason
don’t talk for sometime
but get back together
somehow
same old
story

There is a darkness coming
a little at first, just ahead of the rest

His breath is a slow yawn
it draws in a shade
a cold and a rustling
everything sleeping, drying

An idiot-ox striding
His March drawing blood from flower
herb from mouth

The stampede lasts for months

He is the Harvester
hoof and horn
giggling and dribbling

with the sun on his back
and snow in his mouth

It held my gaze with new eyes
at least to mine

Over the years I had seen
in dreams and mirrors
how Time could personify itself
into a wealth of shapes and sizes
clichés and surprises

Like an apple, or an old man leaning on a crutch,
the hooded skeleton with a cold hand, or a bunch
of keys, an hour glass, draining away its sand
- some easy, some not so easy to understand

But this time Time came to me
as a calf puzzled by its weak legs
licking its own blood off

Father would shout “Boy!”
And Boy would come running
Just like a dog

When he first came into the house
Blooded from the accident
Mother still wanted him
Father cursed the drink and the car
But tolerated

At first he was wet and loud
Mother drying and soothing
While Father’s frown could be seen
Hard through the paper he read
Letting slip the occasional sheet

Once or more
For no reason a hand would rush
Into Boy no reason
no reason Mother would say
Rubbing her baby’s head

Yelps and whining were heard
Echoes from nothing
First through the house
Then the basement

Then the box in the garden
The only thing Father made for Boy
Where he would lick his wounds
Watching Mother at the window

the cockroach, that shining brown-beast,
seems to me repentant of its sins.

would it scurry otherwise
hide in cracks and crevices
eat our waste and squelch
“Thank you. Thank you, sir.”
when you step on its life?

it must be repenting
it must be in disgust of itself.
the spreader of sickness
a symbol of decay

or perhaps it’s waiting
praying for Armageddon
knowing it will laugh last
in the aftermath.

Out of sync I move
with the twitching light bulb
trying to remember him
how he stood and sounded
the shadow he cast
how the air tasted around him

Delving through boxes and bags
I found all that was left, hidden away

I tried on his clothes
the socks fitting
but the rest too small
faded in colour and style

I opened his diary
breaking the lock with the wrong key
and read aloud forgotten fictions
and scenes more true than memories

Then I found his ponytail
wrapped in newspaper
cut at the base and still tied with a band
smelling clean and new
and not grey and old
not even dead at the roots

I lay on the floor
it stares down at me
from the bowl

I have had enough
of its insults.

It mocked me
with its simplicity
taking pride in its nature
its symmetry
its serenity of black souls
in a white heart
within an emerald armour

Even bruised it shone

And it would cut
cut so completely
no blood, no pain

I have had enough
I swallow it whole and wait

Before dawn the pool dried into a million drops
and by Darwin I had found myself next to you
smooth and tense, thoughtless

We waited until the morning to be born
Our siblings buzzing around for a few hours
all dying wet, blunt, while we glided through the gauze

By midday we had caught the tide again
the river carrying us by our scales and tails
I remember how you bit the third gill on my right
anxious like the air

Mud around our ears, the afternoon saw us dry on the earth
our new hair an embarrassing economy
my feet hurt but I pretended I didn’t have any

In the evening you fought as I made you climb the tree
you tore at the branches, and threw a banana at my groin
we stroked and picked each other’s fur to make up

And that night, we lay inside one another
no fruit more a temptation
leaves not enough to keep our innocence

You spoke before you slept, I only understood the words
so I tapped your teeth and gazed into your mouth

I saw how the world had changed us
and how we had changed for each other.

The aisle smiled stoic underneath my weight.
Without the bars support my hips would creak
and I could feel the heavy grind of slate
on bone on crumbling cartilage. This weak
and worn down form – I once would bang my chest
and strike down men or anyone that stood
against my strength or spirit. Who would test
the man I was? But now these arms are good
for nothing but to free the air of flies,
half finger swear the prison guards, or grip
that chair, while lisping rats and all their lies
their bloody lies that now will burn my lip
and melt my heart. Forgive, forgive? Oh lord
I try, but hate is all these bones afford.

and, despite his wasted buried fate,
it was to me that all his dreams were passed;
before I understood, they tried to last,
but now I understand his life too late.

Instead of dreams, my father’s life lived through
his garden. Years of afternoons he spent
turning and weeding, once he earned the rent;
and God he worked till countless flowers grew.

When made to help I’d scream and try to run.
He’d point to the seeds, soil - Now try to see
the soul and spirit; holding, teaching me,
without the faith, no flowers grow, my son.

At planting season, sweating, he would say
no more, just stand, then crouch and then not stand
until each seed was gifted to the land -
the dust was angel skin, the earth his clay.

He could have been an athlete, teacher or
a farmer, or a florist at least.
Perhaps some kind of poet, or a priest.
He should have been a sculptor, builder, more.

The day he died I couldn’t be with him.
But years later his garden had me stand,
then crouch, and then not stand, to hold a seed
and hold the soil, as I’d have held his hand.

I collect them for you
stamps
the other kids laugh
but I don’t care

I buy some everyday
and keep the most pretty
the dark ones I use
on letters to your dad

I’ve got one that tastes funny
a bit like sherbet and dust
it’s only half licked
do you want to try it?

I also make them
from card and hair gel
don’t lick them though
they made my cat ill

But this one tastes nice
a little like cherryade
You can have it
I cut it this shape for you

If I were to give you a flower, now,
it would still be a rose;
dried and pressed,
in an envelope,
second class,

But it would only be the petals,
the bright, beheaded petals.

The stem I would keep to defend me,
All the pollen I would frame and hang.

Any thorns I would swallow,
to give this pain a reason,
while the leaves would be bandage
to the wounds that would heal
tomorrow.

And of the roots,
the roots and bits of dirt,
I would make a meal of

and I would not share it.

drying on a boat
a fish thinks on its passed life
its most favourite times

seeing the bubbles of an oyster's first breath
the million movements of its shoal
its family there and lost in the currents
that near-miss of a shark's vanity

and of the sea itself
its yearning, parenting
its endless voice and ever-presence

the fish doesn’t think of what it sees now
through those drying eyes -

the men that starve the abyss
the fish's old home

Everyday I sneak a peek
gawp and stare, fantasise.

She changes from page to page,
her hair, clothes, company, mood.

But she is always beautiful,
always sexy,

and always only ever has eyes
for me, that follow as I get closer.

But it is just as much about
what she has got, as what she holds –

a calendar of the days, the months,
of the years to come.

The Mountain raised itself
left the earth and paved a way
walked and strayed
a Titan reborn

but as The Clouds it touched railed
and The Trees that were tenants fell
The Mountain knew a hell
how could it walk away?

So it caved in eyes
sent quakes through its limbs
and drew a breath the size of itself
then gasped again for Her kiss

Kneeling he suckled every drop and rock
and became a plain
asking for nothing
but to calm The Clouds
and to once again home The Trees

who only laughed and remained ungrateful

Take the beast
skin, bone, muscle

stand it erect
tear away hair
file down the teeth

then place a voice in its throat
weave expression on the face
a need in the senses

In the brain sear lightning
in the blood the peal of thunder

Watch it bruise and scald
writhe and wring itself

and when it asks you why

leave it
to find its own answer

The smallest thing I ever loved was a pebble.
Springtime. Seemed ordinary enough, until he winked.
Then the sun darkened, my footprints sank into the sand
leaving it wetter, firmer. One stretch and he was mine.

No one would miss him; the mermaids had their pearls,
sunken treasures. I had my pebble, smooth
and snug in my hand in the pocket of my jacket,
protecting him from the world, but not the fluff.

I’ve loved lots of small things. I hide them
for their safety – Malcolm the magnet in a drawer,
Colin the coin in a shoebox under my bed, and Victor
the video I wrap in brown paper and mail to myself-
hugging him home every three days later like an old friend.

But the pebble took longer to name: Paul, Patrick, Percy?
I wrote them on tissue, kissed each one, put them in
the shoebox (Colin didn’t mind the company) and drew out–
Penelope… I don’t remember writing that one down.
The things I love always seem to surprise me.

He sipped a river soup,
nibbled a mermaid’s tail;
Madam baked and cooked
Sylvester’s final meal.

Langston Hughes wrote his mind
and laid out many tables.
He paid a bell boy’s dime
whenever he was able.

But in another’s cafe,
the other patrons hear
Langston’s bluesy laugh.
“Pay no attention dear.”

The waiter wouldn’t wait -
“You Negro, Mexican?
Cos boy you ain’t too white.”
He stood and stared at Langston

who tore into his bread
and smiled and drank his water.
But, still burning, said
“Both. Either. Neither.”

The water still spells up and slices foam,
like dental floss through cotton candy snow.
Surprising sugar teases through the laughter
while tiny hands cup boulders of feathers.
The mothers hold those too young to reach out
without falling in, so their eyes can pour
attention so immensely minute. How
the circus stands around; commuters, so
different from shoppers, slow the same speed down.
Meanwhile, a homeless man now thinks he’s found
a pound in a bubble, blowing his way.
No one sees the empty bottle - the wand.

Much later, while the white turned a see-through,
I watched it melt away, as a thank you.

I am in charge of all the envelopes
within the store. I sort each one I find
by height, width, colour, condition. “Sam copes
well under pressure, right?” Boss had in mind
a man like me – loyal and completely trust-
worthy. Who took responsibilities
seriously. Focused. On task. He must
have seen every one of those qualities
in me. He must have seen them all. That's why
I am in charge of such important work.
In this tough sector, envelopes must be
ready when needed, not just piled high
without any logic. Others might shirk
the job, but I do it gladly, for free.

What a life to live,
a sailor on that sea –
the mind’s deep fathoms
Dark Lands and Dragons,
as far as the eye can’t see.

“Waiter, some freedom, without all the fight.
A couple of thrills, can you take out the fright?
Side order of wealth, but I don’t want the work.
Always a smile, so hold off on the smirk.
And just after sex, I'll be falling asleep
to telly without any ads or repeats.
I want the above, and without saying please.”

He coughed up a stone and then told me to squeeze.

I saw it

Don’t tell me I didn’t

It moved without
beyond me

I thought I dreamt it
Flexing and pirouetting
But it was just being ironic

So I slowly stepped out its feet
Stumbled
ran away

Only time has ever caught up that quickly

I panicked, and raised my hand
scratching my head to think
just as it hit me
right on the temple

I boxed and kick boxed
but it met each limb with its own
and socked me one

I fell on my back
with it sliding
under me, whispering

'See ya next time'

- the Sun will blind me first

that is the last thing you feel,
after whatever your last words were,
after you meet those last sure eyes,

after the yank of the lever,
the wood vanishing
under your feet,

after the rush of air under hood,
after the bite of rope on apple.

That, and the wind’s blow
swinging you to and fro.

Mahmood Hussein Mattan became the last person to be hanged
at Cardiff Prison on 3rd September 1952. He was posthumously
pardoned on the 24th February 1998, at the Court of Appeal
in London, 46 years later.

The history of our race, and each individual's experience,
are sown thick with evidence that a truth is not hard to kill
and that a lie told well is immortal.
- Mark Twain, ‘Advice to Youth’ speech, 1882



My hands tighten until
the pulse in my thumbs
beats with the one in his neck.

Slipping, I glimpse my shield
pierced to the ground,
a hundred spears through it and me.

The rest of the field is just as wrought
our flags rot in the sun with the flesh.

The iron taste is mixed with the last squeal
of my army, an euphony to the enemy.

In the synaesthesia; a premonition -
my name in history, mythology,
the victors and their parables.

I will be the war-thundering king,
the dust-hungry wolf,
the Dame thats jeered at Christmas

that is how the book will be written -
the stone that bounced off my temple
like a toy, was his axe to my oak.

My hands loosen while
the pulse in his lips
drowns out the one in mine.

Shreve, Lamb & Harmon would still stand
proud. With blueprint eyes they'd gaze
high at the point of the sky touched by
glass, metal, the concrete of it all.

How small they would seem
compared to their tall dream made true;
past any son, their name will last
as a plaqued and chiselled slide-rule fame.

It rained the day I came to see,
tour, get bored by the facts, figures, dates,
height, width, floors, elevators, escalators,
cost, all lost in the guide’s babble

while I thought of other towers,
of empires building their way to heaven,
to history, beyond their blood.
“It’s a bit phallic, don’t ya think?”,

a woman at the back proposes.
But it goes so deeper; it is the pole that
holds the flag high, the pen that flows the ink,
the spear that reaches the enemy’s heart.

Of all the shapes what better to make
than this to pierce the clouds,
to scrape the sky, put the fear in God
and give the finger to Death?

The tanks, the hill, the sky, the shrapnel hanging still.
These things, now bleeding black, are all I see until

I feel my lids collapse, as both my eyes wash red.
Wind whistles past the hole they’ll find shot through my head.

My body falls so straight while soldiers turn about.
I make no sound because my voice is hollowed out.

And while the men check arms and Captain shouts them down,
poor Jack is standing, twitching, guiltily looking around.

I had no hope for war, but that my country’s luck
would roll much better than this premature head fuck.



‘Blue-on-Blue’, a military term for friendly fire, originates from war-gaming
exercises where friendly forces were blue and enemy forces were red.

we are more
than those things

our teeth are example

there is no sabre, no tusk
no row of razors
or score of mill-stones

shut your mouth
and you can cut or mash
nibble or grind
you tear off fat chunks
you pulp fine pâté

but they are ordered
arranged
they allow for words
laughter

for kissing
for the tasting of love

I crawled into the loft, to find my tent
(you know, the one that springs up in a flash).
While stumbling past the black bin bags, I leant
over the leaking pipes that soaked my stash
of comics and collectible-but-crap
old toys, and saw a box that I'd forgot
about. It'd found a place to hide; a gap
between the useful stuff (like paints) and not
so useful stuff (like wedding gifts). I dragged
it to the centre of the make-shift floor,
then split it; found inside another box that sagged
in places, opened that box up and saw
a thing which turns all little boys to men -
then put it back, so I'd forget it again.

“OK, that's it, I've had it up to here.”
you said, slamming the book you quoted from
onto the table, adding “What is wrong
with you?” I couldn't answer out of fear,
knowing that any answer wouldn't do.
I couldn't own up, tell you everything.
I couldn't tell white lies, half truths or bring
up all that settled bile and spit “Fuck you.”
No, not a good idea. We stood, we stared.
I'd like to think that in that precious lie
of quietness, we both thought back instead
to all the good times, the happy and shared
defining qualities of you and I -
then skip the row and head straight for the bed.

I slide up, down the concrete steps, a stride
ahead of Sam. His split soles slow him down,
the plastic cutting into skin. He sighs
as if that single breath could be the sound
to bring me to a halt. No Sam, it won't.
I can't leave now, I can't stop, let you rest
or give you half a chance to catch up. Don't
you think I'd like to leave this road less
traveled by to you? But I play my part,
the carrot on a rope, the rabbit tied
to tracks. The biggest problem I can see,
dear Sam, is that you end where I must start.
If only you had faced the sun, and lied
less about yourself, struggled more with me.

Each night for forty years, he'd come straight home,
and set the thermostat to eighty-eight.
While taking off his coat, he'd turn the chrome,
and wait for all the warmth to circulate
round corners of the house that weren’t that cold,
or so I thought. See, I was wrong, knew shit
about... well, anything. So I’d be told
off, shown the truth. “You silly woman, sit
down and just shut the hell up.” Now I’m meant
to set the timer on this new machine
as if the future's known - more to resent.
He never tolerated one extreme,
would simply go and change the facts while I
would warm up to the cold, and to the lie.

She played piano, hidden at the back
of Sam's. Before she came, the dust was thick
on seat and lid - although he laid a sack
on top, to guard from any spill or nick.
Sam used to play the thing himself, but now
his jarring hands just pulled the pints and counted
tills at closing time. He might allow
a friend to touch the keys – although he doubted
any knew his tastes. But this woman,
wordless, just pulled the sack from off the top
like she was taking off her shirt, the floor
staring, as wood and bone were stripped for hands
that played all night - til Sam called time to stop,
just when his hands trembled too much to pour.

A window frame - a crooked matte-grey square
that peels and cracks around the mould - a green
that smears when touched. I usually close the screen
to shut out light - today I leave it bare,
bar lines of condensation. Here and there
are chips from stones flung up by cars - they’ve been
going too fast. I stare through prisms. Seen
a lot of things from here. I wheel my chair
up close, and watch a child, held on a lead -
he kicks, tugs at his mum with all he’s got.
I sit and note the cars; their make, year, speed
and whether driven carefully or not.
Most aren't. Most rev and screech as if they need
to be somewhere - they burn through my black spot.