Simon P Walker

People make each day an assumption,
Shared by default, universally
At the deepest level of unconscious type
Inherited by Lamarkian ontogenesis
Insisting upon a vital preferment
Of a commitment to life.

  For the correction of our conviction
  We have Mr Darwin to thank.
  Whose neo-protagonists insist upon this reductionist drive:
  The demanding genome commanding the phenotype
  To posture, puff and perform
  Against more muted tendencies to hide.

  ‘Z reg car and alloy wheels’
  Walls in glaring blue, or, stenciled
  With acrylic borders, disposable stone candlesticks
  And iron beds make for us reason enough
  To subsist, sustained as we are
  By this ersatz fraud and the blood of the coloured globe.

  Absurdity is not a condition
  Which, in itself, necessarily renders
  Pointless the preoccupation with the mundane.
  On the contrary, such happy escapes, make
  A nice toleration and anesthesia
  Which, when inhaled, lifts gloom.

  The slow prophet alone
  Makes his way against the tumbling leaves
  Bustled along by the malicious wind intent
  On stripping the green branches bare,
  To an end against which they have on objection
  Or salvation, save the Word whispered in the storm.

  ‘Private ceremony and
  Not too much water please.’
  One wonders, at this infantile request,
  Just which it is newly born, so ignorant, uninformed.
  The communion of the saints and the death
  Of sin, make little domestic play these days.

  To receive a gift
  Is an art not well practiced
  Amongst those who own, possessing eternity now.
  Yet ‘All is gift’, donatus dei, sacrament proffered
  In the messy bloodstained hands,
  Treasured treasure, taken, with thanks.

  Thus, Mr Darwin we find
  A sublime reversal, overturning
  Selected priorities, foreseeing a deeper reality true,
  Whereby the soul survives by divine intents
  Committed a priori and resurrecting
  The dying bones from the flame.

I still insist upon
The strangeness of a world so
Alien, existence here is tolerable barely.
Yet the Other’s preference has compelled
The dark days toward an end
In which even the soul’s struggle shall be healed

Simon Walker
July 2001