A Pretty Sight. David O'Meara

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      slight pivoting, as Camus would call it,

      when we glance backward over our lives.

      What we keep in the pause between facts

      might be the beginning of art. Which is where

      we are in this room tonight. I’ll have to stop there;

      the teleprompter is flashing for wrap-up. Following

      tonight’s program, I’m happy to announce

      an extra ration of Natural Form and H2O

      will be served by the airlock. I think

      you’re in for quite a show. So hold on

      to your flight diapers as we cue the dancers

      who’ve timed their performance to the backdrop

      of Earthrise. There it is now in the tinted

      north viewpoint. Look at that, folks. To think

      they still find bones of dinosaurs there.

      Background Noise

      Home, my coat just off, the back room

      murky and static, like the side altar of a church, so at first

      I don’t know what I hear:

      one low, sustained, electronic note

      keening across my ear. I spot

      the stereo glow, on all morning, the cd

      at rest since its final track, just empty signal now,

      an electromagnetic aria of frequency backed

      by the wall clock’s whirr, the dryer droning in the basement,

      wind, a lawn mower, the rev and hum of rush hour

      pushing down the parkway. I hit the panel’s power button,

      pull the plug on clock and fridge, throw some switches,

      trip the main breaker, position fluorescent cones to stop traffic.

      Still that singing at the edge of things.

      I slash overhead power lines, bleed the radiator dry,

      lower flags, strangle the cat

      so nothing buzzes, knocks, snaps or cries.

      I lock the factories, ban mass

      gatherings, building projects and roadwork,

      any hobbies that require scissors, shears, knitting needles, cheers,

      chopping blocks, drums or power saws. It’s not enough.

      I staple streets with rows of egg cartons. I close

      the airports, sabotage wind farms, lobby

      for cotton wool to be installed on every coast. No luck.

      I build a six-metre-wide horn-shaped antenna, climb

      the gantry to the control tower, and listen in.

      I pick up eras of news reports, Motown, Vera Lynn, Hockey

      Night in Canada, attempt to eliminate all interference,

      pulsing heat or cooing pigeons, and yet there it is:

      that bass, uniform, residual hum from all directions,

      no single radio source but a resonance left over

      from the beginning of the universe. Does it mean

      I’m getting closer or further away? It helps to know

      whether we’re particle, wave or string, if time

      and distance expand or circle, which is why

      I need to learn to listen, even while I’m listening.

      Socrates at Delium

      What do I know? At least these

      last two mornings since the Boeotian

      ranks massed. The whole lot of us

      had been camped inside their border, sea

      at our backs. We thought we’d soon

      be home in Athens. A set of cooking fires

      still smoked behind the earthworks, evidence

      of a hurried defence at the temple we’d occupied,

      an obvious insult. The old seer took

      the ram and made a lattice of its throat,

      our counter-prayer

      for the terror we hoped to inspire.

      Across the dawn fields, the enemy trod

      through the stripped orchards and wheat,

      farmers like us, setting out cold in linen

      and cloaks, the well-to-do armoured

      for glory out front. After weeks of marching,

      the suddenness of it: the general’s shouts,

      his interrupted speech passed down the lines,

      our pipe marking the pace, and far off,

      their war cry rending the November air

      like a thousand sickles. The black doors

      of each empty farmhouse watched our lines

      clatter through stubbled stalks,

      my arm already heavy from the shield.

      ‘Stay tight, stay tight,’ we called across

      the bronze rims, cursing and half out of breath.

      Then a new shout went out

      and we spilled up the ridge at a run

      into the Thebans’ spear thrusts.

      In the push, there’s little room for a view;

      dust scuffed up by thousands of men

      gagged the air. СКАЧАТЬ