Two Poems By Charlie Bowden

New Iberia

There’s a red man under my bed, ugly as sin

with pitch-black fur and a voice that pricks like a pin;

his claws are obsidian, his tongue is dynamite

but most deadly are the dreams he hurls into the night.

They toy with telepathy and send a message shining

to say that he’s made me a bed that I best lie in.

But then

there’s also

a woman

in my mind

who’s made

of the sun

making sounds

I can’t quite

articulate

but still

she leads me

safely

into reverie

away from

the red man

and his swarm.

Is this

heaven?

I think

as she

drags me

further

into

the blue of the cold wet night, no sun to light my way.

The Sound of Simon Armitage’s Shed

When it gets dark outside,

the sound of Simon Armitage’s shed validates me. 

I can ignore the bitter of winding of the wind as it howls

down stairs, up trees, through leaves and out again

and sink into the welcoming, well-worn chair of Imtiaz Dharker’s rhyme.

I’m made glad when the muscle memory of my heart

makes a mark against the viscous, sharp resin of the sky,

my fountain pen spidering over its moonlit sheen

from the soft breath of the warm shed on my flowering seeds.

The scent of sweet pomegranate surrounds me.

I come home smelling of glee, my smile a patchwork tapestry.

Guests often come and go through the shed,

the ghosts of those who are blessed to hear what the garden says.

They sense the echoed sound of a hand reaching to pick from the poets’ tree,

the delicate feel of handcrafted paper beneath their feet, evergreen.

There’s poetry in the stars, you know,

and in the stories of the seats in the park

and, most certainly of all, in the poignant moment:

 the Passover of stress into relief in the dark of the Poet Laureate’s fief.

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