Perfect Poems

The Love Song of J. Hamish Watson

Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening lights up the London Eye
Like a corpse autopsied upon a table;
Let us go, through memorised alleys and streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in overnight trains and cabs
And Chinese restaurants and hospital labs:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of unswavering intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question…
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
I’ll make all clear at the next visit.

At the scene the police come and go
Talking of my brilliance so.

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do they ever think?” and, “Do I care?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With the thick luscious darkness of my hair—
[They will say: “How his hair curls like sin!”]
My swirling coat, my scarf mounting firmly to the chin,
My suit rich and modest, no adornment needed, no shiny pin—
[They will say: “I envy his body so lithe and thin!”]
Do I care
If I solve the universe?
In a minute there is time
For deductions of rapidity which others find perverse.

At the scene the police come and go
Talking of my brilliance so.

For I have known them all already, known them all;
Have known the evenings, mornings, and nights yet,
I have measured out my life with beakers and pipettes;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the traffic from outside the room.
How can I not presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all—
The eyes that I’ve placed in jars in microwaves,
And when they are captured, sprawling on a pin,
When they are pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To explain all the results of my days and ways?
How can I not presume?

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the bombs, the arguments, the tea,
Among the wreckage, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have deduced the matter with a smile,
To have sorted the universe into a ball
For an answer to some underwhelming question,
To say: “I am a genius, come to the wretched,
Come here to tell you all, I shall tell you all”
If one, settling a blanket round his head,
Should say, “That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.”

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the stakeouts and the suspects and the chase in
streets,
After the papers, after cups of tea, after the detritus
along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It’s impossible for you to hear what I mean!
But as if a rolling suitcase threw dirt in splatters on a
stocking:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling on a chair or throwing off a coverall,
And turning toward the window, should say:
“That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.”

No! I am not Prince Mycroft, nor was meant to be;
I’m a solitary man, that consents to
Hint toward progress, solve a scene or two
Clue the police; no doubt, those simple tools,
Self-assured, glad to be of use,
Direct yet tactful, and meticulous;
Full of clear sentence, n

ot a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost obvious—
Always, at times, the cool.

I grow bored … I grow bored …
I shall wear the bottoms of my pajamas more.

—Anonymous

(Photo is not ours)

“Tell me about the dream where we pull the bodies out of the lake
and dress them in warm clothes again.”

― Richard Siken

(Picture not ours)

Perfect Crime

From time to time, we turn to lovers

Leaving ourselves behind in time.

We turn to criminals, we turn to killers

And we ravage others from within.

There is no other perfect crime in life

Than loving with passion and desire.

Through time, love leads to strife

But we still got to love each other.

It’s really no ones fault for this

That we’re both criminals and victims

But it’s a pleasure to be kissed and kiss

While falling into the abyss.

The longer does the prelude take

The slower will you die by love

And while hope still flies above

The killer will still love you.

-Richard Caleb

(Original photo found here)

Impressions of a Pilot

Flight is freedom in its purest form,

To dance with the clouds which follow a storm;

To roll and glide, to wheel and spin,

To feel the joy that swells within.

To leave the earth with its troubles and fly,

And know the warmth of a clear spring sky;

Then back to earth at the end of the day,

Released from the tensions which melted away.

Should my end come while I am in flight,

Whether brightest day or darkest night;

Spare me no pity and shrug off the pain,

Secure in the knowledge that I’d do it again.

For each of us is created to die,

And within me I know,

I was born to fly.

-Gary Claude Stoker

(I have traced this picture back to http://autofectionate.deviantart.com/ so I’m quite sure that is who originally drew it.)

221B

Here dwell together still two men of note

Who never lived and so can never die:

How very near they seem, yet how remote

That age before the world went all awry.

But still the game’s afoot for those with ears

Attuned to catch the distant view-halloo:

England is England yet, for all our fears–

Only those things the heart believes are true.

A yellow fog swirls past the window-pane

As night descends upon this fabled street:

A lonely hansom splashes through the rain,

The ghostly gas lamps fail at twenty feet.

Here, though the world explode, these two survive,

And it is always eighteen ninety-five.

– Vincent Starrett

(photo credit to http://awildellethappears.tumblr.com/)

To John Watson - From Sherlock Holmes

This is hello and goodbye John,

I know that all is well,

Remember two twisted minds John,

From Reichenbach we fell.

I know it must be boring John,

When cases all die down,

Yet still with waking eyes John,

You’ll see crime around the town.

And though I’d like to wake John,

And play another game,

I’m playing life, and loosing John,

Death always wins the same.

By the time you read this little rhyme,

I know I’ll be long gone,

But don’t be angered by the time,

It’s job did nothing wrong.

I remember I once said John.

That you were my one friend,

The one friend, that you stayed John,

Right through to the end.

Another chapter finished John,

Another must begin,

You’ve tried living on your own John,

Knowing I would not be in.

Any time you’re by my grave John,

Or look sadly to the sky,

I will not be there either John,

See John, I did not die.

-SH

-Esther FleurThomas

Home, Sweet Home

Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,

Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home;

A charm from the sky seems to hallow us there,

Which, seek through the world, is ne’er met with elsewhere.

Home, home, sweet, sweet home!