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"Inland Surfer" (my greatest poem)

Poetry Portfolio

Inland Surfer

from my book (1999)

In the beginning, expectation’s pornograph moulded assumptions

That the cutesy parents deemed fluorescent;

The dutiful had steady certainty of a stayer;

But for the martyrous it would be a disaster.

Elucidate the contortions of an arbitrary grouping:

 

You play then I play a card. Refracting in the rally.

Pause, pause for me, buoys. Slithering into the gaps of who expects it.

The encounter was a probing of faults, ball-slot, a sequence of shops.

And fashion was a hot shaft for safe commerce.—

But I cannot stay my mind to describe the mutant reapings of the dance.

 

Even slight confidence kindled an entire quire. Imitating,

Subdue your clamour at confiding the top layer of horrors:

Even the holy meek do not encompass the raunts of warriors.

The fervour uncontrived and unfanciful; peripheral glide,

A wavering ammeter. Occasionally, a minor recess, the twanging ruler.

 

Most did not ascend to note each teacher’s limit of concern,

By sedative respect or being themselves stubborn.

The academia was a rail, and the ghosttrainride of the most faint and brazen

Finished with a dumbness seeking company. Stability and flavour truncated

Upon assured stagestrutting, leaving the shell.—

 

Haunt me with a cello, plead awareness of the pastiche,

Single-out me as a monument, O you patience of chairs!

My nasal sobbing shall reverb until the tandem

Drumming rain expires. I am a sweltering

Ark in the dark mosaic, impressions of a body, heaving.

 

Either you have it or you don’t. This ego

Invested-in this spirit, this body. But grievous

Acceptance proffered the critical daggers of dishonesty.

I fell asleep with the track on repeat. The disc

Shimmers, a mirror of my imperfections.—

 

Come, regal fire!—a proud and raucous unison. A strength

Mutually checked, with glum shame mauled by tigers.

And in this aftermath, from the flurry, is even a broad

Kinship. Outcasting was tacit and settled: Plod-away, vagabond. He does,

And the ensuing absorbing discussion to identify the normal guy is futile.

 

You could be a child struggling to surmount,

But when they looked-square to you, you had to be a man;

And they were grateful at this easy development in microcosm,

A gentle denial. My friend, there was a man standing on the beach,

Gazing neither far nor deep into the ocean, shining.


WILDAIR THOUGHTS: GIFTS FOR THE ORACULAR

11 May 2026

Preening myself in this sweetsick lake’s plage,
My majesty of plumage, wet with decoupage,

Stirring the grasses, wind under my wings,
Silent, to hear how your own brilliance sings!

Cold to the moisture, clay to melted earth,
Forming of heart and its bursting-proud berth,

Needling to wicks of fragrance, stark in air,
Whence crawls the creaks of love, once nestled there.

The querulous, the queer now standing here
Smaller than they appear, remember with good cheer

The gifts of heartstrung chattels, whet with hands
To hold me dear, where flung the mountain sands!

Come forward, ye who travelled here alone!
Whence we have strayed, and given, soon be gone!

Whether from ice of throne, or steel icon—
Whence we have strayed, and given, soon be gone!


 

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© Marcus Ten Low, 2026

Please be considerate of intellectual property and its origins. Kind To All Beings!

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