This is the cover of Milly’s new book, ‘Death for Art’s Sake’, soon coming out on kindle, and later on smashwords.
Eighth book in the Mike Malone series, this time Mike finds himself drawn into a macabre murder, all in the name of art…!
image © copyright Milly Reynolds 2013
Don’t hold out a torch
for me, I am not free of blame. This
is the dance of life where all are
culpable, soon to be drowned in
washes, the mangling gears
of pain. But who knows, these maelstroms
might be wormholes, revealing other
worlds and tableaux of night; dressings
of props across cold stone walls, taken
and rebuilt from dishevelled remains.
And where bards once played on stages,
hidden behind arras stitchings
and nom de plumes, we are all still
mere punters in pits macabre, holding
torches for celebrity – look at them, drunk,
high up with their gods of gold
© poem copyright David F. Barker 2013
These are my favourite clothes, I
wear them for days on end.
See?
They retain their shape,
my shape,
even when I toss them
into wardrobes, or hang them from
skeletal frames, dis-
assembled, waiting for warm
odours of my living
return.
So say you’ll never throw them
out, and resist all
temptation to wash. Simply
lay them on a chair or bed – though
mark the creases,
the bulges of cotton limbs, fleshy
legs which have moulded denim,
now hanging in threads. And make sure
to study the greasy collars, precious
oils of my skin. Then take
hold of this shirt, stretch the faded
fabric in your hands and breathe in
the smell of years. Remember
the walks and our talks, when
there was only time to kill. For these
things, which may be nothing now, are
still worthy of note, the relics of
a single life
and not without right
image and poem © copyright David F. Barker 2013
Strange to say, but as the snow
falls your nosebleed is like
a punctuation, something else
we can remark upon, something
other than this relentless cold,
our sparse Siberian spring. Harsh
economics brings with it
other extremes; people
who must choose between
eating or heating well into
April’s empty promises.
Some of them I know,
not the tragic ones who stare
at me from television screens,
directors tugging the stretched
strings of my heart. No – these
are stalwarts and forgotten
heroes, men and women
who have given their lives
once and don’t complain while
they slowly freeze or starve
in little houses, not so far
from me. Now they give up
on living so cold hearts
can balance their books.
But we fixed your nose, it was
easy in the end, though who
fixes this town and this world, is
anyone’s guess
© copyright David F. Barker 2013
Hope arrives at January’s
close, whether in presages
of spring or several feet of
snow. Right now with snowdrops
peeping, the increasing length
of day, it’s all palpable
at last. Then you call me your
rock – I’m very far from being that,
a mere
step, a name on some
useless bifurcation. Outside
it is twelve degrees; bring on
the west wind and
hope of spring
© copyright David F. Barker 2013
Ciscography 