An Old Receipt (or "Gluttony")

butter, flour, six eggs and
more, cream from the
top of the jug, the

fine-ground caster sugar
the Madeira wine spilling
over the glass and onto

his tongue, shifting his limbs,
gout-inflamed, seeking relief
from the jagged appetites

never surfieted, never satisfied,
always chasing the last crumbs
round the plate, sopping the

gravy with still-warm bread
while others hungered for
the crumbs from his table,

his veins hardened and cracked,
blood sluggish and stultified,
knife and fork ever at the ready

Don't Lose the Morning (or "Sloth")

a dream of rest extended
until mid-day; if you lose
the morning you'll

be running the rest of the
day to catch up....still....
delicious to close your

eyes against the world and
lapse again into sweet sleep
and those oft-coursed dreams

of what? Desires
in a dressing-gown, moving, sluglike,
room to room, leaving a clobber

of debris behind, teacups, the
crusts of a late breakfast, the
kitchen, hastily cleaned before

drowsing into a late afternoon
slumber........

Another Mills and Boon Romance (or "Lust")

and so, Admodeus passes a sweet
from his lips to hers and she
hungers for his limbs with a thirst

in her throat born of the desert, those
barren moonlit nights her body
was silvered over and the

peacocks screeched in the
zoological gardens and she
longed again for that thrust

and retreating from her, the
taste of his mouth, hard upon
hers, the bristle of his hair,

hell-singed, his eyes blackly
staring upon her whiteness, those
pillars of ivory borne down

upon to the breaking point and
then, the shattering of the
sky, broken so by his laughter

Goldman Sachs (or "Greed")

grasping, so, he places the paper,
made flat to stack, in the
storeroom, these notes that will
grow grey, then golden, over the
course, the term of years set down
in inky black, always more and
more, and more again, singularly
unsurfeited he is, the small
voice in his soul bellowing, belligerent,
in polyester trousers, crowned with
beads of sweat, the veins roping out
of his neck, coursing blue--he

cannot

get

enough

to satisfy the counting-house of
his mind, the calculations of
compounding interest lulling him,
finally,
into fretful sleep

Lucy in Her Courtyard (or "Pride")

Lucy tosses her locks, superb in
this sylvan suburb of
pleasant oaks and holly-hocks,
the ivy curling round the grandly
gated house, her
haughty step a clattering of
well-shod hooves upon
the paving stones carved to
her exact specifications,
caressing her barefoot soles as
she ensures that the
neighbors see only the
best and brightest
made her adornments, the
stones ground and cut, displayed
in her hair, glittering tiara
hiding a baser metal, the
manacles, too, mind-forged, she
seeks to place round his wrists,
this young one, lean like
a whippet, head laid upon
her lap

MaryAnn and Brendan Walsh Christmas Greeting 2009

Happy Thanksgiving Greeting 2009

McCarra/Poetry Broadcast 4

On Veterans Day

Let us remember that "People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." George Orwell (1903-1950)

"So Like the Phoenix" to be published in The Mount Vernon Times

"So Like the Phoenix" -- which appears on this blog, is to be published in the next issue of The Mount Vernon Times newspaper.

This issue is due to be distributed throughout the City of Mount Vernon and should be available shortly.