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AMY CORZINE
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Poems by Amy Corzine
Published in Walden Writers One, UK:
Message from a Pigeon
by Amy Corzine ©2003
You land upon an office monolith
And peer at me through the window
Half-faced, with a sweetness in your eye
Looking directly into mine,
A look that says:
Remember me
in your good fortune,
I who must live
within the fortunes of the wind.
Accustomed to having my feathers ruffled,
Used to scavenging,
Dependent on the ways of Man
for my survival,
And the little bits of grain
and water not poisoned
that I can find
while dodging His machines
on earth and in air
And resting on His buildings
that are not pigeon-proof.
Remember me
Remember us
We live here too!
***
Published in Walden Writers Two, UK:
Down on the Ground
by Amy Corzine, ©1998
The night of my life had come
When a sudden bright sun
Crossed my skies
I wished a wish
And it was gone
Hurtling into stars.
Now church bells ring
It is still night
And stars wink at me from above
Like children’s kisses
Blown on thin air
They touch the soul like love
Too far to reach
Those diamond lights
Keep silent all they know
About the space
We cannot meet
About how far
It is to go.
***
Published in Kindred Spirit Magazine, UK:
In Meditation
by Amy Corzine, ©1999
Is this the movement
of moons and symbols? –
this the movement
of runes and stars –
The candle that burns
so brightly
The shine that inside
grows rightly
All the years of dancing
All the years of rain
Lie beside me nightly
Wander inside my brain
May all beings be happy
May all beings be sane.
***
Published in Caduceus Magazine, UK:
Trouble-free
by Amy Corzine, ©1999
Oh little Lamb who made thee?
Not the butcher the baker the candlestick
maker.
This March wind wafts the stench of butchery
Across a city where humans eat and drink
A chemical cocktail,
Numb to the stink of piled high corpses
All over this green and pleasant land
Now smeared with blood from slit throats
Now riven by barbarians who pee in street
and train
Without shame
Their criss-cross roads tick-tack-toe
This house-pockmarked jewel in a diamond
sea.
Their lust
Now takes pot shots at your innocence
As you dart this way and that –
A new wildness in your eyes –
And litters deep pits with the soft bodies
of your kin
Ignores the small still voice
And forces the poor, the sick, the Abels
of the lamb
To be barbarians too.
Oh little Lamb who made thee?
And us, your kin?
How long before the busybody money machines’
Silvery tin voices from ice-gloss smiles,
eyes
Empty of your meaning, blind to your worth,
Make us, like you, hobble to our death
And swallow whole their opiates for the masses,
Breathe their million million lies in their
world trouble-free?
Oh little Lamb who made thee?
Toymakers, toy players, of little dolly things?
Oh little Lamb who made thee
Lie cold and still upon the hill?
Oh little Lamb, Greed made thee ...
Trouble-free.
***
Published in Dandelion Magazine, UK:
Princess of Pigeons
by Amy Corzine ©1997
They came with their aunties and children
and grannies
Single in Sunday best suits
Or jeans with bright flowers and low volume
trannies*
Showing their strong British roots
Paying homage to goodness or a pagan goddess
Observed dashing from each avidly reported
mess
She found or created
Eased or abated.
They came without newspapers or smiles
But with solemn faces
Some having travelled many long miles
To leave flower traces
Of themselves or to find
Some kind of peace of mind –
Many were women alone or holding a child’s
hand
Who joined the long queue of shufflers to
see and to stand
In front of the Palace and its sea of dead
flowers.
Nearby were parked the media in vans
Hawking gossip into cold cans
Building a mass hysteria and blame
All grieving focused on a passing flame
With flashing lights and neon
With hollow newsprint upon
Thin papers which end
In tunnels of wind
Like the lives we lead
Like the lies we read
About little girls
With little blond curls
Who play with dolls then babies then more
–
Until we see it was not – just –
Lore.
I throw crumbs to a pigeon
Walking straight to my sandwich.
Suddenly winds of bird wings stun
Me so that I blink and twitch.
I am surrounded by birds –
The lucky ones with crumbs
Being pecked by the bums
While the others in herds
Look hopefully to me for more,
Not seeing that I have none in store.
I am a princess of pigeons – just like
you.
* transistor radios (British slang)
***
Published in Walden Writers One, UK:
For Sean MacBride Who Last Month Died
by Amy Corzine ©1983
In the little white church where he had returned
His poet friend’s body to the old sod
He spoke of warriors who battled with swords
Of gold made of light from the Son of God.
While heads nodded with the last rays of
summer
Through Bible-picture-stained-glass, his
kind murmur
Made my eyes open to see
I was part of history.
‘What can be done for Ireland?’
I asked.
All we can do is try, his eyes flashed.
And when the photographs were taken and the
sermons done
About the need for winning without the aid
of a gun,
His car sped past where I stood by a grave
–
A gash of light in my soul from the brave
Old man
Who leaned toward the glass
With eyes that seemed to ask:
‘Do you know I am dying; will you continue
the task?’
Beneath rustling trees I lingered to look
out over the graves
At the heart of a cross with its symbol of
sun
And wondered
At the way my heart had lurched toward the
old man’s,
About the battles still left in the world
to be won,
And the high noble ideals that would not
let him rest,
And what his eyes had asked me – and
why I felt bereft –
Sniffed cut grass and roses in an air
Free of trouble and stone despair –
Stared at a crow and the fast-moving sky
That sweeps the world clear of the Lie.
***
