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A common hate enriched our love and us:
Escape to parasitic ease disgusts;
discreet expensive hushes stifled us
the plangent wines became acidulous
Rich foods knotted to revolting clots
of guilt and anger in our queasy guts
remembering the hungry comfortless.
In drafty angles of the concrete stairs
or seared by salt winds under brittle stars
we found a poignant edge to tenderness,
and, sharper than our strain, the passion
against our land’s disfigurement and tension;
hate gouged out deeper levels for our passion—
a common hate enriched our love and us.
From A Simple Lust, 1963
Untitled (6 November 2009)
They say they want us to succeed
they say they wish us to be happy
and they lie: their mouths are full of lies
for they obstruct our efforts to make a living
when there is room for both malls and street stalls?
Must the pursuit of profit govern our lives
when nature sets an example we could follow
she gives generously and unselfishly of herself
for you, for me, for us all
Untitled (6 November 2009)
You can go to the malls if you choose
they’ve been designed for your pleasure
and the food is organically modified
and sterilized and chemically prettified
Our stalls are the same as they’ve ever been
they were good enough for the first traders
our produce and our prices are good
we depend on it for our livelihoods
You can go to the malls if you choose
a foot-soldier in the march of progress
swelling the profits of large corporations
and unpicking the fabric of our nation
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