POPPY

 

Have you ever seen a poppy?

No! - You I mean!

Have – You – Ever - Really - Seen - A Poppy?

Not one of those sissy things that get into French fields

growing in the remains of wars

on earth and dead men as if they didn’t care;

nor the yellow ‘Welsh Poppies’ that aren’t really poppies

- nor are they truly especially Welsh -

that spread anywhere in broken ground ----

but the Great Poppies

bigger than a despot’s snatching palm

red as blood and love

with a splash of crimson gaudy as a rock-star

and seeds dark as blood and murder

shouting out of the green feathery fronds into the soil

flinging purple-black seeds enough to cover the whole world

if all erupt like guns and dragon’s teeth.

These are the Real Poppies

of which riches are made.

 

Now take each quartered seedhead,

secretly, cunningly, melt the teeth into a pipe,

sell them to the people by ear or mouth

and all the whole world will see poppies translated

and BELIEVE in dreams of saints

and preachers and monsters and dragons

and magic and Changes and Knives

and even Tomorrow............

 

and – most probably –

the words of the man who takes the money.