Melroberts.net
David Attenborough was married to Jane Oriel (her surname is the same as a beautiful bird) for 47 years before her death, aged 70.
Trigger Warning: I absolutely admire and respect him These poems contain violent imagery about him.
Death of a Naturalist
Turn, On!
To blust-fare with pomp-glitscreen.
A familiar knight in sky blue shirt
urges understanding.
There's unfathomable plasm-oodles
wonder-life waves
evolved, diverse permutations
creative dimensions and spaciating changes.
The life of Attenborough
treasured
imitated
preserved.
We want more, Sir David!
Elsewhere a syrup smart killer observes
her lens flexes to frame him
a honey blend mustering upwind
coiled close.
David remembers his Jane,
“She deserved more time, like me.”
He clears his throat
and as the camera focuses he has no idea.
She is rippling speed
his legs oscillate and lumber
look back in terror
eyes lock in snap shot leap.
Bouldering paws blur-thud
rick-bone rib-crack, forced flat.
“No, no, no!”
Steaming stuffering stink-slobber clamp.
David's blocking arms red ribbons now
agony rakes the size of a city
un-containable. Gone.
His flaccid gurgle vibrates to her electric agony drum.
Now is now is fast,
now is now is rip-snap bite.
“Oh Jane, what is this?”
“We all love you, you can go now David.”
David Attenborough is changing
sky blue shirt
sky blue
sky
A golden bird.
“Jane, my Oriel!”
The Animal
There, see? Easy oldy-bone meat
juicy wish squish
mother's milk, tickly bake grows
get it, for my littlies.
Need your gnaw-gristling in my jaw
air sour-streaks
sniff fear-reak
flutter drum of terror beat, weak.
Bite it, burst it, smash it
slicey juice it
mine it mine Mmmmmm steaming scarlet spillem.
Bowel flop spill of hot wet red
slurp on fur stick-crack
get you dead thud good
that's what's done
death.
you know my kind Mr Attenborough. smiling
Have you pooour out, yes
have you my good babies, yes
love you full, yes
love you
mash
swallow. Or Mash you good
Covid Kitchen 2020
Now to begin
our familiar evening again
an Ikea chaired reminisce
the days events
the dead numbers
sprung beech, nod rock
at your own pace, my mate.
A fag is lit, lighter noted
I wash the bottle again with soap
its first pitchering glug to glass
as time untwists
tiny darts trill and bend in descending light
skyscape background.
A slight niggle evaporates softly into silhouetted sky
your voice, a mellow flow
we agree and whinge and explain and listen
inner smiles, outer additions
dusk has released my forehead.
Our habit is quiet, then
thumb scroll, press play
with the smoke and the wine
in our dust dancing kitchen
in these dark days.
Poem for Manchester 2021
Necky pigeons dance a purple petrol strut
Home in on, then reject a lanky semi-chip
then flock off, scarves and tails flapping.
Cocky Manc birds reeling
In the smell stream of warm spices
Look, the familiar glow of Raja's beckons
Step on, spattered stone streets where everything has happened
They are, we are part of something greater.
Let's go! They coo, so we do
Stretching our wings wide we soar, reckless, inventive
Over ghostly horned trams, over reaching skyscrapers
Friendly towns, cosy pubs, welcome homes
We dive through cherry blossoms scattering themselves
And the pennine spine lifts us on.
I just love it, mates, sounds, proper laughs
Come on then comer inners, born and breders
To where bands begin and Mondays can be happy or blue
Where invention gives your head a wobble
And everything's brilliant but don't get addicted
Where our city can be united.
Alright our kid? Sit down in sympathy
Have a cuppa tea, you're home.
Storming
A towering umbilical cord fills my mind
Rooted in sea and sky
Grain-grey sinews suckscream in falling skies
Growl to howl, judderboom crackstat
Chalk breath wicked through sliced mouth
Hails the iron sky
clotted wail through riven throat
A quick slip. Hard skull smack
Pain crashes
Face spatters
Tears blasted off dark gulping cliffs
Clear shivering drops
Spitting steel needles
We must go on
I hurry along this black iced track
Hearth and home in ten
A bleak disk emerges
Skewered to the fracturing sky
Slate and salt
Clot and smear
I keep moving
All things will change
Picture a smile, my friendly fire
friendly fire
The Submerged Thing
It’s just me here, smiling
escaping to broad side strokes
swim suit scamper in brilliant glare
crunch a blunt beat.
Toes pick a path through a wake of cast off crustlings
as the rasping gullets of gulls close in, on the lowering tide.
Froth splutters soft on the rocks and slips below
slivers of daydreams and glancing memories... on the rocks
my arms sweep the sizzlings on the sea
and a submerged thing forms and reforms, then is gone.
I shiver into glittering sheens
pulling past silvery dribbles, past winkling veins of water
patting the velvet rock for good luck I kick off
on - off in – out
breeathe and blow
breeathe and blow.
now I see it, the submerged thing forms and reforms -
scan below the slapped waves - now I don't.
I am upside down now pulling deep
the grasped kelp tethers me below
looking up, through the membrane of rocking patterns
back through the muffled sound waves, the sonar background
sweeping with slow motion
hold me here in this vast swaying.
Far away the Sun sucks at the ocean with splintered tongues
clouds vomit silently through themselves, and will not stay still
lungs hunger and will not wait
rhythms pillow inside my head
the kelp is slipped off and I rise
Break the surface, breathe and spread
winds murmur and race
with whistling blows and twists
whilst the Sun silently boils itself.
the silent shock of really looking at a long way-away shore.
From the bedrock, the submerged thing seems to stare
it wheels around and diminishes
I feel it's pressure, it's echo in the ocean.