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Chris Murray

  • bow down / bough down published york literary review

    October 28th, 2021

    bow down


    a harrowed tree
    nest-ruined
    tangled leaf
     
    Its bough down
    bow down—
     
    a-flowering-tree
     (still, it flowers)
     
    Submarine blue is
    where dawn occurs
      (South/South-east of here)
     
    Dawn’s lightbox runs
    from north blue
    to south warm
     
    The point between
    is lit-not-lit
      (nor) seamed
     a bas-relief.


    Copyright 2016, 2018 Chris Murray
     


    Bow Down from ‘bind’, first published York Literary Review, Issue #1 2016 https://blog.yorksj.ac.uk/yorkliteraryreview/files/2017/05/2016-YLR-for-download.pdf

    Online URL https://blog.yorksj.ac.uk/yorkliteraryreview/

    Collected bind 2018 https://turaspress.ie/shop/bind-by-christine-murray/
     


  • ‘seed’ published timber poetry journal, 11.2

    October 28th, 2021
    Seed
    
        Willow, cut to its hidden houses.
        Something secret furls 
        unfurls its stem-self
    
    seed
    slopes    slews 
    under    crystal 
                     skin    
                     (its)
    flesh 
               blooms
    to tone –
    coralling a milky alumben
    in water’s distress,
    floats,
    |stays|
                       alive
    winds its silver
    thread in brine –
    fleshed frond
         &
    secret, 
                still –    
    a
    silver thread
    pulls-up
           willow’s
    ochre
            curtain.
    Truncated
    cut, yet
               I saw it —
                    willowGrove
                               willowGrief — 
    
    winter / flower / blossoms 
    lie on wet ground 
    bereft of their generations
    
                               seed will lie
                                   | seed will lie |
    
    
    
    
    Copyright Chris Murray, 2021
    First published Timber Literary Journal, September 2021
    Online URL: https://timberjournal.org/archive/seed
    
    
    

    a note about the text

    the poem seed responds to a series of poems (seed, cells, hunger) first published in the blind (2013). I have taken the blind out of circulation as I am working with the text at this time.


  • ‘notes on panic’, and: ‘in the dark i feel’, and: ‘small bird voice’ published revista itaca

    October 28th, 2021
    Notes on panic
    
    
    Shall I regard the dark
    knowing it is past?
    
    Enmeshed in the ‘once was’
    certain–
                  scored, a
    
    stampede carrying thunder
    into my corridors,
                                chambers,
     
                  a knife–
    
    Revistant
    Pass!
    

    In the dark I feel,
    
    dark edges
    pressed-down
             ridged— 
    tight-laced-seals
    
    Soul is unquiet –
    its speaking voice
    is the sea—
    
    Rain, 
    rain falls on
    all things—
    
    awaiting dawn’s song, 
    her joy 
                glosses                                                                            |joy glosses|
    this inundation
           with light,
    pearls
            beads—
           whitelit,
                      Green—  
    

    Small bird voice
    
    Pipette piccolo
    in a tall,
    the tallest tree 
                     How
      high it climbs
    How tall the vault –
       small-bodied-bird
    small-voice-vessel
              La sua voce!
    his silver notes
          at pitch
              tip-tail-trill
                  He weaves
    his threads round, 
                               He
    reaches the loftiest branches
                        wren-warbler
         carrying his small song
                         garden-wide. 
    
    

    Copyright Chris Murray 2021

    First published Revista Itaca, Vol 35, September 2021

    Online URL https://issuu.com/edituraitaca/docs/itaca_nr_35?fbclid=IwAR11NBY9HsBOvMAl-06RC0NBa28uCCdOnBQAy5J7DY1G72qwl6eqDQUOgyY

    …excepting the poem small bird voice, first published Gold Friend (Turas Press, 2020)


  • ‘lily crowded window’ published formafluens literary journal

    October 28th, 2021
    Lily crowded window
    
    her
    not-breath,     mine
    signs our presence
    at the glass,
    | hers and mine, our presence |
    Blue 
                Milk, the
    cooling sun
    plays her opaques,
    leaf speckles,
              variegations.
    Retreat 
                        now,
    She drains into winter’s dark
    work                   July-begun.
    She 
                            drains North.
    Setting to rest
    yellow-tips brown,
    Sun-held-once.
    
    Something in secret   furls,
    unfurls its stem-self       a
    creamy-gold,                lit.
    
    
    © Chris Murray 2020 / 2021
    
    

    lily crowded window was first published at FormaFluens Journal, April 2021, Editor Tiziana Colusso

    Online URL https://www.formafluens.net/

    Downloadable PDF URL https://www.formafluens.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/formafluens-magazine-n.1_2021.pdf


  • ‘moi et la village’ (d’après Marc Chagall) / i and the village (after marc chagall) published recours au poème

    October 28th, 2021
    moi et le Village
    (d’après Marc Chagall)
    
    Version française, Elizabeth Brunazzi
    
    La rosée découle en jade une lune aux trois quarts
    L’Amour O l’amour! Ta fleur arrachée embaume
    
    De son parfarm ma main, bientôt
    bientôt me rappelant une certaine musique-
    
    Mon destin a toujours été de quitter le lieu
    où la lune dansait avec la subtile Neptune!
    
    Tout se dissout-
    sauf le souvenir de ton visage,
    ton rire en pleine rue et ta danse pour la lune!
    
    Tes bagues de jade et ta fleur sont mes bijoux,
    nuançant toutes choses d’une teinte de vert, de pourpre, d’un bleu profond.
    
    La rosée découle en jade une lune ornée comme un bijou,
    Sa fleur blanche fond sous le bleu.
    
    Je me souviens d’un visage, maintenant fixé en lumière,
    maintenant un ton, une bague ornée de bijoux, une certaine nuance brillante.
    
    French translation Copyright Elizabeth Brunazzi 2013
    
    

    i and the village
    (after Marc Chagall)
    
    Dew drops into jade a three-quarter moon.
    Love O love ! Your uprooted flower dissipates
    
    Its scentedness onto my hand, soon
    soon recalling to me a certain music -
    
    My fate was always to leave the place
    where moon danced with subtle Neptune!
    
    All dissolves -
    save your remembered face,
    your laughing in the street and your dancing for the moon!
    
    Your jade rings and your flower are my jewel,
    shading everything green, and purple, a rich blue.
    
    Dew drops into jade a jewelled moon,
    Her white flower dissolves under blue.
    
    I remember a face, now caught into light,
    now a tone, a jewelled ring, a certain bright hue –
    
     
    Copyright Christine Murray 2013
    First published Recours au poème, Issue 74, 2013
    Online URL https://www.recoursaupoeme.fr/i-and-the-village/
    Collected in Cycles Lapwing Press, 2013
    Online URL https://sites.google.com/a/lapwingpublications.com/lapwing-store/home
    
  • ‘narcissus’ and ‘stalk the open ring’ published compose Journal

    October 28th, 2021
    narcissus
    
    not step twice into, not
    step back from stream.
    its nets are storm blackened,
    
    narcissus’ flower is a cut out. 
    it has shut in cold,
    skeining back into his bud
    
    echo and,
    outbreath.
    
    he skeins back his thread
    the blind buds are always.
    
    step
    (not-step)
    back then.
    
    step
    (not-step)
    back then,
    
    from the black river nets.
    
    
    
    
    stalk the open ring
    
    stalk the open ring,
    this waystation.
    
    others speak him out of chrysalis,
    it is voice brings us alive.
    
    it is an unearthing of voice,
    brings us alive.
    
    his hands bound by feathers,
    red wings, a difficult birthing.
    
    
    Copyright 2017 Chris Murray
    Online URL Compose Journal,  Spring 2017
    
    https://composejournal.com/articles/chris-murray-two-poems/
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
  • ‘hunger’, and: ‘ceremony’, and : ‘suspend i’ published ditch poetry

    October 28th, 2021
    hunger
    
    outside the ragged bird tears
    dead flies from the window nets
    
          and it is not clothed right
          - it claws the glass
    
    
    suspend I
    
    from the mirror architrave
    float down silken threads
    they are not blackened yet
    
    from the branches they reach down
    laden with fruit
    out on the limb
          birds beat them for their dessicated meat
    making sweetmeats for desperate bills
    
    a man is clipping the edges with steel
    season’s treachery
    
    
    
    suspend I
    
    from the mirror architrave
    float down silken threads
    they are not blackened yet
    
    from the ceiling hooks
    float down wisps of
    red thread - almost
    
    cobweb light she is
    arched back unsure
    whether to suspend
    
    burnt orange silks
    cover the shutters
    there are children in the street
    
    she is nonetheless
    quite bound-up
    in red ropes
    
    from loop at nape
    and length of torso
    it is peaceful, still.
    
    being spider-rolled
    webbed-in and arched
    as if.                             a
    
    bird swoops down
    behind the orange silks
                                          shiftshape-in
    
     
    suspend I
                                          as if
    she were an exotic fruit
    a seed caught in breeze
    
    from the mirror architrave
    float down  silken threads
    they are not blackened yet
    
    cobweb light she is
    arched back unsure
    whether to suspend
    
    in the red threads
    that loop at her nape
    down the length
    of her torso
    
    dividing and opening
    her out achingly
    if she moves the
    threads will tighten
                          the harpies are perched in the suicide-trees

    ceremony
    
    the red rope is looped around the neck
    and brought down the back to the bra-line
    
    it tightly binds across the top of the chest and
    is looped down to the cunt lips separating them
    
    held-to and pulled in the back arches back
    bow-bent as if its wood had seasoned in
    
    an iron girder above hot embers and released
    steam onto a still lake the hook retracts when
    
    the dress slides into a blue ripple onto the boards
    there are six hooks embedded into the ceiling
    
    stockings catch up the desert breeze on a small
    balcony , a strip of silk portholes the room and
    
    sutras are tacked into the walls the hooks do not
    look as if they could carry the weight of an inert body
    
    spider-rolled silk-skeined red-cocooned
    the bird panics spider-fruits from under
    dry eaves 
    
    these net-webs are laden with the small dead
    best not to move  he is demented with hunger.
    
    © C. Murray 2013, 2021
    Copyright 2013 Chris Murray
    
    Published Ditch Poetry
    Online URL https://www.ditchpoetry.com/christinemurray.htm
    Collected The Blind Oneiros Books, 2013
    

  • ‘lares series’ published indelible literary journal

    October 28th, 2021
    Preamble
    
    Break the glass
    that shields morning's flame.
    Proceed from your room—
    
    
    Ferns, once
    
    We awaken in our bodies, again.
    Their smooth hurts. Winged, for
    the pigeon wakes too, her back
    to the City. Mourning dove.
    
    
    Notes towards an image
    
    Iron ring
    copse within.
    
    Leaf // settles
      Jewelling | nowhere
       her    Garnets,
       Emeralds. 
    
    Side aches to unclasp
    this constriction,
    this leakage
    of things–
    
    To want to be in the world,
    to want to be of the world.
    
    Crown the jewels
    crow Red
    all   || Mouth
    City as frieze.
    
    
    Pillar
    
    Ravenful,
    haven of claw.
    Dawn’s
                 fluidsong
    dissipates—
    
    Rise up,
          regain
    Light —
    Dark and down,
    My song is more than silhouette.
    
    To bring light,
    lightsong,
    O
    Brightsong,
    to soothe my ancient
                sing to pierce the breast.
    
    
    Soft, the softening rain
    
    Sing to pierce the breast—
    Sing to pierce the breast,
          nighthooks brim to split.
    
    Sing to pierce the night—
    Sing to pierce the night
    -hooks brim to split.
    
    Dawn’s contraction,
    slow the opening—
    orchis-white         a Yellow 
    
    toned song to loosen the gum 
    that holds peony’s ample heart.
    
    
          leaf   //  Settles
    									
    	Jewelling | nowhere
                      her      Garnets	
                tempering | Scarlet
                           on   steel
                           the   Sky— 
                            a   Leaf
                            there 
                              is
                                  
        
                                                          Lares
    
                            Break the glass
                            that shields morning's flame.
                            Proceed from your room—
    
    pause–
    
    I am night (dark)     afraid
    begin now, begun     my 
    mourning for what was–
    (not) slaked by light’s coming
    The lares of my house is
    twice-lit:  dawn’s advent,
    night’s candle.
    
    
    
    
    Copyright 2020 The Lares series by Chris Murray 
    First published Indelible Literary Journal
    PDF download https://documentcloud.adobe.com/link/track?uri=urn%3Aaaid%3Ascds%3AUS%3A05d41b1f-bcd4-45b0-a75f-fc6e26fced00
    This series was dedicated in gratitude to Eavan Boland 1944-2020
    
    

  • ‘morning star’ published irish times poetry

    October 28th, 2021
    Morning star
    
    The day lightens from cold
    to blue. A glint of her caught
    in crow’s diadem as he wheels
    
    home. We are bound to hard things,
    to wood, steel and wire —
    Who would hear heartsongs
    
    In the cacophony of words
    tumult-born? Day is carried 
    in by crow’s harsh heralding
    
    through and above 
    stormy crosscurrents.
    Soaring. His fluid gyration.
    
    Even now, now, his harsh
    heralding is the one true thing.
    
    
    
    Copyright Chris Murray 2021
    First published Irish Times Poetry
    Online URL https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/poem-of-the-week-morning-star-1.4676001
    
    
    


  • morning in the garden – siirden / cycles/ empty house

    September 27th, 2021
    morning in the garden
    
    O heart !
    
    My tree is full of small birds,
    red flowers.
     
    I am below the level of the bee,
    the wingbeat of the wren.
     
    A new robin dapples through his
    never-ending blue, green.
     
    My tree flowers
                      beat red like hearts
    in warm rings.
     
     © Chris Murray 2016, 2020
    
    Published ANU #48 (ISSUU)
    Online URL https://issuu.com/amosgreig/docs/anu_48, Edited by Amos Grieg
    Published in translation Şiirden #37, Turkish translation, Müesser Yeniay
    Collected Empty House Anthology, Doire Press, 2021, Edited by Nessa O'Mahony, Alice Kinsella.
    Online URL https://bit.ly/3m4R9gE
    
    

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