STANLEY WILKIN THE FINAL FAREWELL I HopE You AgREE THAT NoW AS THE WoRLd gRoWS coLd ANd THE SKY IcILY gLISTENS SHEATHINg THE SuN THAT IT IS TImE To REmEmbER TImE To FoRgET WE muST SAY FAREWELL To WHAT WE WERE ANd AccEpT WHAT WE WILL bEcomE?
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STANLEY WILKIN
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The Final Farewell Time To Die Sea Dream Successors Heat Deluge Beautiful Moroccan
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THE FINAL FAREWELL I know you haven’t heard from me For a millennium, but here I am Still around, still observing, still involved. I am ancient of course but no older than before When you knew me as a warrior-striding Over flaming mountains and trembling seas. Do you remember?
4 Do you remember how I inspired you from The clouds? My voice like thunder, My voice carrying lightening from a darkening Sky? ……………………Well, anyway, good to see You all once again. I actually haven’t been myself recently. My legs have troubled me. My eyes Have been plaguing me. I cannot see the earth Clearly anymore. In my wizened vision It resembles a roughly-used marble, I am after all, now and forever, the ancient of days.
Here’s the thing. I’m getting bored both of Your antics and your obsession With me. Please, lighten up! I made the Sun so you would smile, children to give you hope! But, it didn’t work I fear.
I can abide your petty squabbles. Truly I can. I can abide your desperate need For war. It’s quite exciting really and once, see above, I played My part. The agonised features of the dying Appeal to my nasty side to be honest. I have a very nasty side as you are well aware. I like your skyscrapers, your irritating-as-flies planes, Your huge cities, your good as well as your promiscuous Women, your strange observances Songs and poetry. It is all very jolly. But, And it’s a huge ‘but’ I must admit, I have grown bored. You no longer inspire me. I am no longer
5 Eager to view your funny ways When I wake, and before I sleep. It used to fill My momentous frame with unnatural warmth. I’ve decided your little planet must go. Sorry, I’m like that. I follow my whims. Tomorrow, at 10 I turn off the light So, please, stop praying. It’s so depressing, especially As you’ve prayed with equal fervour To every other god that graced your planet. And still, let’s face it, do! There will be no reprieve this time. Accept your fate! You will not feel a thing! So, let’s make our final goodbyes. I have really enjoyed your companyAu Revoir. Oh, please stop cryingFace your fate like men, even the women amongst you. It was great fun after all for all of us. Remember, Nothing lasts forever. Not even me!
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TIME TO DIE When it is my time to die Will I be frightened,
7 Will I weep, struggling to hold onto the light, Will I pointlessly wonder why I must embrace the end My breath coming slowly, my sight
Searching through darkness? Will I hold onto My loved ones, hoping to stay As I expel in a volatile mess What in life I have been through Passing on my way?
As life disappears And emptiness beckons uncontrollably Will I know to let go Embrace my fears Leave with unruffled dignity Fall calmly into that of which no one can know?
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SEA DREAM She noticed the basking shark was wounded, weeping vaginal blood. The tall man in a fedora whispered as he passed. Whipped by exploratory waves, she blushed. The horizon was a hazy green line dipped in red. She had been there since morning searching for love, and found it from a six-pack merman offering solace as he rode on the silvery back of a ray. As he approached, the sun at his back, she moaned and threw out her arms
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Complete at last, the sand grasping at her shoeless feet, she sank towards the earth’s distant core using her arms as uncertain ballast.
She awoke with a shiver brushed away the sand and headed back home. The shark had turned belly-up, scavenged by seagulls.
Another day-dream enjoyed in the empty hours between lunch and dinner between her third cup of tea and fourth cigarette, her children snoozing in the back bedroom. Half-slumbering in a town barked at by bothersome seagulls where an unencumbered sun set on a postcard shoreline. Planning the rows of petunias to be planted by the hedge, making shopping lists, writing novels, never to be published, staring out of her windows at the sea she waited for her husband’s return, tedious evenings of T.V. and coition under the brightly coloured duvet. The waves that overwhelmed her, flooding her senses,
10 were her own. The man in the fedora had made her smile.
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SUCCESSORS In ragged feet, I rushed across the bridgeGleaming periwinkles flourished in the distant fields Reflecting the cloud-free sky, Golden sunflowers pitted the hills like pus. In the distance, Fringed with yellow and red, stood a tent And within was the warlord, aged now and grizzled, His parchment skin and toothless smile a rebuke To his youthful triumphs. His guards parted. I entered Into a swirling fog of scent A floor covered in bright-coloured carpets.
12 Gesturing, the old man bade I move closer And, belly swollen by hunger, I slowly advanced. Touching my forehead with a wrinkled finger He said: “You are my successor.�
I ate well for months. I was given my own guards, My own beautiful tent. Even though only a boy I received several lovers. Those around me always listened To my words. They obeyed. Every other day, beneath the pubescent Glare of the early sun, I hunted deer and lions, protected By a hundred archers. Every day I dined on venison.
The old king rarely left the camp. Late morning he donned his shimmering, Armour, reflecting shards of brilliant light, And for an hour reviewed his warriors On the nearby heath, soured by winds. He, A wretched old man wrapped in ermine. After, as a whim, sending them off to die, Dribbling from his lips, beneath sunken cheeks And rheumy eyes, at the end of his creeping Days. Returning to his tent, swaddled By remembrances. Impotent in body and mind.
We played cards together once a month
13 Surrounded by slaves. The candelabras burst With perfumed radiance: musicians played Soothing songs on cymbals, drums and flutes. Girls danced; swinging, pirouetting, Leaping in the excited manner of newly-born fawns. The air grew heavy with dust. The air grew pungent with odour. Scattered around were dishes of date and melon.
“When I die, twenty years from now,” he began, smiling, Popping a date into his mouth. “You will be king. And rule as I ruled. A celebrated warrior and judge. A killer of thieves, destroyer of cities. When old, As I now am old, you too will seek a successorA ragged, hungry boy born to rule, who one day Walks into your home.”
The king dipped a date into goat’s milk. He watched me as an owl watches a mouse, His moist lips smacking audibly. “But that will Be many years from now.” He continued. He smiled again, the smile of a torturer.
Within the year I lead his armies, Rampaging across the wild, blasted plains And to the walls of distant cities Leaving piles of bones. I returned With wagons full of gold, dragging behind A thousand slaves. The king meanwhile Lounged in his garlanded tent eating sweets, Hoarding his growing wealth, washed and perfumed
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After two years I planned his death, And claimed the kingdom for myself.
When spring came the mountain rain fell, the rivers overflowed, The sun was a yellow bud, My armies rested on the hills Polishing their weapons with dew. The king had ordered veal that day cooked in spices From the east. He drank watered wine. The multitude of slaves sang love songs with pitiful voices. I stole into his tent at twilight. He lay asleep on his divan, bloated and belching. A warbler burbled in the trees, A jay cackled from bushes by the water’s edge. I lifted my knife and softly approached His slumbering form. He opened his eyes and smiled As I buried it in his chest.
I sit on a throne surrounded by my Endlessly-victorious regiments, king of a thousand lands, eating Fruits from India, chewing fragrant leaves from the furthest isles where the sun Burns forever. I have grown fat. I have grown old. I look out towards the bridge, Cracked, worn, covered with vines, vexed by the Rivers surging tides. I search the horizon For a ragged boy bringing in his unblemished soul My death.
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HEAT The climbing heat of the cruellest summer Transcended pool and wood Feeding upon The huddling men.
Their bodies saturated with sweat, Foreheads brown, the fighting done, They talked together of both home and future In the manner of men casually strolling Through a park or meeting After work, drinking tea or beer.
One pointed to a wound That swelled slowly Popping a cigarette in his mouth
16 With quietly accomplished bravado. He was a shrewd hand at dying. He understood the drama well.
The weather grasped the defeated Unearthing their cries.
The field was marked with blood Flies rushing about in exhilaration at The sudden banquet. Last gasps, inaudible farewells, came through the silence. A vociferous diatribe of artillery Resonated like an enfeebled ghost Vanishing into cloud and mist.
The field was abandoned to carrion and dogs. There were too many to bury. Sunset fell upon them like a worn bandage Torn off a seeping wound, The light distinguishing the horror in a flash.
‘A fine time we had of it,’ the old soldier said As they bore their burdens to the next Hurried engagement Where the dead seemed to outnumber the grass on which they lay.
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DELUGE The bridge collapsed after the storm tumbling into the raging riverI watched in tears, adding to the deluge.
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BEAUTIFUL MOROCCAN Dressed in black, dark eyes amused She strolls into a room With the specialised tread Of a femme fatale, Tossing her streaming hair in arrogant joy. Her perfect body Contains the calm and unexpected force Of the sea, shifting in a moment between
19 Reason and fury. She graces the men with sure-footed Arabic, Stark, sibilant, passionate words Laughing like a poem. A Moroccan beauty, Guedra dancing in the sun, From the desert coloured mosque of Casablanca Punctured by the worship Of 70,000 songs, To the unremitting souks of Marrakesh, Her complexity Emboldened by the courage Of poets.
She has a silence in her intellect Such as few have, Unusual evidence of a soul In a world of franchises, Her past imaginings deeper and wider Than that of her peers, Dancing to fast Gharnati rhythms, Beneath imagined Andulusian sunsets And glowing skies. An effervescent scintillating gasp of fervent Desert air, beating across her limbs Moving gently towards silence.
In night time, drifting through the dust, She sleeps forever.
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STANLEY WILKIN