re: wordings
poems in response to the
like exhibition by nmit poetry students
Carol Cromie
The Case for Exhibit A
in response to Fran Allison
Objectively speaking, Exhibit A
(for want of any other name)
is neither beautiful nor admirable
desirable or wearable
not inspiring, not useful
it is not anything
Even its creator owned she itched
when she'd finished the job
to plop a steel block upon it
and squash it (the bitch)
A ring size, a pot shape,
silver stained black as a boot,
hollow, floor pierced with poles
set square like stool legs,
each on rounded foot,
all reaching for that upper lip
Subjectively speaking, Exhibit A
has mystery, not too much,
form, roundness and such,
ambiguity, possibility …
and it has rather appealing eyes
What? Yes, of course it has,
see, one here, and one next
to it there - not there, there
If A is part of something more
when the rest materialises
it could leap into power
and astound us with logic
or charm us with magic
For now it is shy and it is lost,
its small round eyes beseech
Pic Picot
20DX18hmmm
in response to Fran Allison
washed in the muted roar of a turbine overhead,
a tiny blackened engine waits its turn
its edges etched with hard white light - sharp
cut, new
a less cautious builder (or a careless curator)
might have polished you
dulled your edges, sapped your strength
untouched, you wait
silence against the roar
dull against the glare
stayed from above, stayed from below
unknowably, perhaps dangerously heavy
Michael Knight
It Is Confused by Me
in response to Andrea Daly
There it stands,
A deformed top hat
Perhaps abstraction of feminine
Standing on legs of two,
A half turn and now three
Quarter turn back and four
Upside down, invisible legs
Triangles forming circles
to conceal the hollow core
and dark insides.
Sealed with a ring
It Is Further
Confused by Me
As a bird views
An obnoxious pink button
no-one ever wants to wear -
Purposeless, yet there it is.
And now it has fallen
A plug living forever
With no socket
To escape from within it
Become born again.
I am confused by it.
Bella Reid
Like What
in response to Peter Deckers
A platform
for who
we will never know
you keep your secrets hidden
A cage
to keep your spikes in
no lights
or sound to guide
the bewildered
a look out maybe
for random thoughts
that you can snare
and begin to court
A non-essential
obsolete beacon
contrived from words
that can't be beaten
Alexandra Nelson
Jewellery of Tarot
in response to Peter Deckers
The colour, almost like haematite,
Its body stands proud as the tower,
Yet I could hold it in my hand,
Its frame as a cup,
But beneath, it's spider-like and wispy,
Four frames of coins within the cup,
It stands on four legs strong as swords,
Eleven wands shooting outwards,
An arrow full and feathered.
Marian Fraser
Back Where You Belong
in response to Karl Fritsch
I take you from the display case
you are a pretender
I smell that straight away
Back where you belong
on the narrow window ledge in the workshop
balanced in dust between hacksaw blades and pencil
stubs
I soon forget your exact function
but you wait along with those washers on a nail
and the spare fan belt speckled in fly-spots
With time it is hard to distinguish your form
spider webs are a great leveler here
but your purpose is all the same
you could come in handy
Jude Hawkins
Contemplation
in response to Caroline Gore
Round and smooth your gleaming steel
could rest in a small lined palm
whose fingers reach to touch
your cool unblemished skin -
but you are remote, suspended.
Four protruding portholes
incline toward each other - but
could be funnels: minute,
they commiserate, confer,
in all ways communicate.
I see the sinking Wahine forty years on,
helpless in aggressive seas -
new stories surface of bodies
smashed on rocks - of broken steel
and shackles and people that don't work.
A silvered cable pierces your back
unseen, until I change my stance.
That cord, twin-coiled, shouts
Seatoun, the family home -
my saying things unsaid and then
twisted truths dance here and there
in a mesh of family ties.
I like the way your tiny portholes
lean close for comfort, yet
think contamination when I see
that dominant band.
Your cylindrical perfection
would warm me more
without that binding line.
What if your shiny cable were cut free?
Would the substance of you float away?
