Poetry from Andrew Cyril MacDonald

Cheap obituary

Shot nerves clasp
undue cause 
wrested from the brain.

They put to press
makeshift scrawls
their ill-bred worth.

A sick greed for more
knows which god
trite errors played
when night curtailed 
this conjurer’s show—
some revolt four-squared
slow to touch
if matriarchy approves

a loveless life 
indelicately owed 
this one
fought for hinting trysts
plausibly taled 
if funeraled loose.

It breaks that fast
naked words
shape of etiquette outdone.


Leave 

To wed these blithe earth plumbs—
their end before they start.

Now they shelter their wombs
for fear they should be got

un-groomed from shot-out fields
civilization took, playing each
in games their worth
small lives little understood.

Through dirt and sludge
of needs made real
they take these in
duplicates of what enthrals
if done as work forgives

to come returned 
in left behind
lost time their broke youth bid.




Concert at Palestrina

Light climbs the ground 
relic poises.
It bribes in gain
of loved one’s devotion
pursed lips speak from,
loud their faith enticing.

Now it’s a truant kiss combative
the notions flesh scrapes of
unharnessed ambition
patriots adore.

Still, there is no mark here
save that which chants freedom,
our paled superstition
restless becoming 
the postwar world.

It’s the subtle involvement
of a heart’s notes love gives to
so that what she comprises
are the scales of justice
we hope for
a concert outlining.





Coma

Our love formed of passion
thrown to fevered pitch.

It was of secret devotion,
that surabundance involved
prelude to a cause

where bonds were just such purchase
trite notions bled,
exchanged for remission
governance hid
along our boredoms at death.

Now to marrow it goes
and quick along
what traces each judgement
slight errors trend
of a séance attending
we neat grow from—

these, some mere throng contestant
the peace against your bed,
hand-held and endeavoured
wishing you’d contort in.

Our love formed of passion
and this, here in end.



Andrew Cyril Macdonald considers the role of inter-subjectivity in poetic encounter. He celebrates the confrontations between self and Other and the challenges that occur in moments of injustice. He is founding editor of 
Version (9) Magazine, a poetry journal that implicates all things theoretic. You can find his words in such places as A Long Story Short, Blaze VOX, Cavity Magazine, Experiential-Experimental Literature, Fevers of the Mind, Green Ink Poetry, Lothlorien, Nauseated Drive, Otoliths, Synchronized Chaos, Unlikely Stories and more. When not writing he is busy caring for seven rescued cats and teaching a next generation of poets.