WordSalad: The Poetry of Luke Prater

Violent profusion of a thousand greens
spiral beyond peripheries, seen as would
a drunken Mayday Greenman,
thrashing feral in verdurous vomit.

Moss carpets and cut grass floors
roll out cable-knit and hit with the smell
of Her cyclical push, made more heady for
freshness of the cut and overnight rain.

Greenman up ready to strut again with reason,
luxuriating, fornicating with ripe Maypole
amongst rampant flora and the buzz of all that is;
Winter is deepsixed for another season.

Green (prose poetry)

Violent profusion of a thousand greens spiral beyond peripheries, seen as would a drunken Mayday Greenman, feral and thrashing in his own verdurous vomit. Moss carpets and cut grass floors roll out cable-knit and hit with the smell of Her cyclical push, made more heady for freshness of the cut and overnight rain.

Greenman up ready to strut again with reason, luxuriating, fornicating with ripe Maypole amongst rampant flora and the buzz of all that is; Winter is deep-sixed for another season.

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The last person I want to forgive is he I need
to most. Made sick stockpiling resentment,
indignation, recrimination; fuelling an empire

of hatred sending it the way of the hater.
Greater, with guilt and regret, comprise the
pantheon of pernicious spirits stood at the foot

of the emotional spectrum. Conscious
forgiveness, without forgetting – learning
in our amnesty – is betting on the right

mare to dare clinch the derby. The last
person I want to forgive is he I need to most.

Forgiveness (Prose Poetry)

The last person I want to forgive is he I need to most. Made sick stockpiling resentment, indignation, recrimination; fuelling an empire of hatred sending it the way of the hater. Greater, with guilt and regret, comprise the pantheon of pernicious spirits stood at the foot of the emotional spectrum. Conscious forgiveness, without forgetting – learning in our amnesty – is betting on the right mare to dare clinch the derby.

The last person I want to forgive is he I need to most.

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“It never came to any good”,
they would say, with self-satisfied
hindsight, as if a halfwit couldn’t call that.

Then, as always, it was forgotten;
they continued chattering about
the big and the small (mainly the small),
until bodies capitulated, and higher selves
were ready, or required, to ditch the derelict.

Then, as always, they were forgotten,
even by their dogs. Those still sparring
with the breathing section of the
Life Cycle continued chattering about
the big and the small (mainly the small).

Mainly the Small (Prose-Poetry)

“It never came to any good”, they would say, with self-satisfied hindsight, as if a halfwit couldn’t call that. Then, as always, it was forgotten; they continued chattering about the big and the small (mainly the small), until bodies capitulated, and higher selves were ready, or required, to ditch the derelict.

Then, as always, they were forgotten, even by their dogs. Those still sparring with the breathing section of the Life Cycle continued chattering about the big and the small (mainly the small).

☆

This has been rewritten as a villanelle – I wonder which of the three forms serves as the best vehicle for the content/statement?

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There was a time
when sex was a capricious portcullis
and platonic playmates were few;

those I knew were bent, or bent the rules
and fools we felt when we lost the love,
not that I dug the push and shove, but

guys were vastly less complicated for a
hormonally elated-unelated semi-obscene
and masturbated hetero teen.

The portcullis guard was put in the stocks
and pelted with boxes of rancid tomatoes
for being a toxic incompetent sot;

his successor took the task seriously.
Mishandled once or twice, but the
emotional intellect of Circles of Sisters

buried a derelict teenage libido,
swiftly short-shrifting potential fowl-play of
an inner turkey, and chickens were made of

single-night Braves, limping lacklustre hungover.
After Custer’s last one-night stand with ten
beers in one hand, I opened my arms to Plato.

Circles of Sisters (prose-poetry)

There was a time when sex was a capricious portcullis, and platonic playmates were few; those I knew were bent, or bent the rules, and fools we felt when we lost the love, not that I dug the push and shove, but guys were vastly less complicated for a hormonally elated-unelated semi-obscene and masturbated hetero teen.

The portcullis guard was put in the stocks and pelted with boxes of rancid tomatoes for being a toxic incompetent sot; his successor took the task seriously. Mishandled once or twice (more nicely), but the emotional intellect of Circles of Sisters buried a derelict teenage libido, swiftly short-shrifting potential fowl-play of an inner turkey, and chickens were made of single-night Braves, limping lacklustre hungover.

After Custer’s last one-night stand with ten beers in one hand, I opened my arms to Plato.

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Monday evening. Tired. Tired of the must-do’s and must-be’s, tired of work, tired of me. Desultory thoughts, back and forth, formed no train in that ransacked brain. She was hours away, if I knew.

“Just one, then”. I cursed my inability to say no. The Green Goose was thrumming, humming like an alcoholic beehive: lanky geezers, serious boozers, student schmoozers. Beer-bellied BA hons propped up complaining pool-cues, lassies tried pints for a larf and splish-splashed them down their bras and over tables; ladettes showed ‘em how it’s done with a few swift raisings of the wrist – gulp gulp – only adding to that belly fat, such a disgrace in a pair of jeans two sizes too small. Tummy-blubber bulged over beltlines; bling bling bellybutton-rings and belly bracelets out-of-place on bellies like that, shitfaced and disgraceful fat ladettes. Here’s a quid: buy yourself some save-face decency. I caught my critical eye and forced it the fuck shut.

Jason, and drinks. A few we knew swept us up in their lager-lust and we danced a trail of pubs, bars, and the Club was in sight. Hazy Quid Mondays. Student Night. Always. Though not for me, not that year. One minute, one beer, and I was pressed up against the velvet wall by lips that looked like they belonged to a girl from class. Relinquishing my glass, I managed a glance in Jason’s direction: him and her friend were locking faces.

“Come back to our place?” They lured us back to their lair in the sharp October air with promiscuity and the promise of their housemate’s Absinthe we would pilfer. Absinthe… I wondered as I wandered in the fresh air, the booze draining from my head full of dreads and dreams and dreadful schemes.

Shots of Absinthe: disgusting. Disgusting taste, disgusting sticky-bench tasteless student kitchen, disgustingly tasty sticky situation; looking forward to it getting even stickier. Down came the owner of the precious green vomit. Explain away, girls. Blaring, raving, then appeased at 4am, returned to his cave. I didn’t care. I was young, felt sexy. I laughed, disgracefully shitfaced. Need a quid, Luke? I moved my eyes in the direction of the stairs. Angelina, angel of the moment, acquiesced and we slunk to her bedroom. Lavalamp. Ambient electro… no… that’s trip-hop… uh… Stop. A peculiarly pert pair of breasts stared at me.

“I need to tell you something,” she said. I lay back on the bed. “I’ve had implants”. And she was keen with a razor. Nothing normal about this Monday night. Not my normal natural girl, with naturals, and natural curls.

The next day I was the colour of the precious green and reeling, feeling about to vomit. I reached, half-blind, for my wallet. Where was it? Black leather held together with undergraduate dreams, weighed down at the seams with shrapnel and receipts from Tesco cash machines. It was empty. I was empty. All I needed was a quid.

I never went out on a Monday again.

NB. ‘Quid’ is British slang for Pound, as in GBP £ (currency); ‘shitfaced’ is very drunk; ‘Tescos’ are large supermarkets students often shop at. The story above is all true. I was twenty-three and in the third year of my first degree (see picture). This is my first attempt at prose-poetry proper.

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