Wednesday

Poems from Novels (2000-2008)



  1. from Nights with Giordano Bruno (2000)
    1. One night of spindrift fog ... (6/12/97-2/9/98)
    2. Look at the picture ... (30/9-13/12/99)
    3. Vampires suck (23/10-19/11/98)
    4. Mercury Lane (3/11/99)

  2. from The Imaginary Museum of Atlantis (2006)
    1. Ithaka (after C. P. Cavafy) (30/8-12/10/04)

  3. from E M O (2008)
      EVA AVE:
    1. E M O
      1. Welcome (5/6-14/7/05)
      2. Inheritor (10/4-14/7/05)
    2. Metaphors of The 1001 Nights (30/6/95-2/8/03)
    3. Moons of Mars:
    4. Burmese Days (20-23/3/03)
    5. Trois filles de leur mère (24/11-2/12/01)
    6. Free Love (20/11/04-25/4/05)
    7. Marriage (14-26/8/99)
    8. The Stranger (14-17/8/99)
    9. Ovid in Otherworld:
    10. Tristia 3.2 (12/7-15/8/06)
    11. Tristia 3.3 (13/7-27/8/06)
    12. Tristia 3.8 (18/7-27/8/06)
    13. Tristia 3.10 (11/7-27/8/06)
    14. Tristia 3.12 (13/7-27/8/06)
    15. Tristia 3.13 (13/7-27/8/06)
    16. Tristia 5.7 (13/7-28/8/06)
    17. Tristia 5.10 (13/7-28/8/06)
    18. Tristia 5.12 (13/7-28/8/06)
    19. Epistulae 1.2 (14/7-29/8/06)
    20. Sleep Threshold – Hypnagogia (15-29/6/06)
    21. Epistulae 4.7 (14/7-30/8/06)
    22. Epistulae 4.10 (14/7-30/8/06)
    23. Epistulae 4.14 (14/7-30/8/06)
    24. Fasti V: 421-44 (27-28/9/06)
    25. Jack's Metamorphoses:
    26. Monkey (10/8/07)





Jack Ross: Nights with Giordano Bruno (2000)


Nights with Giordano Bruno. R.E.M. Trilogy 1. ISBN 0-9582225-0-9. Wellington: Bumper Books, 2000. 236 pp.







Un soir de demi-brume à Londres Un voyou qui ressemblait à Mon amour vint à mon rencontre Et le regard qu’il me jeta Me fit baisser les yeux de honte … [Guillaume Apollinaire]
One night of spindrift fog in London a boyo who was the dead spit of my lost leader Shackleton came up and took a look at it …


(6/12/97-2/9/98)

Publications:
  • Nights with Giordano Bruno. R.E.M. Trilogy 1. ISBN 0-9582225-0-9 (Wellington: Bumper Books, 2000): 87.
  • "Dark Depths." Nights with Giordano Bruno (2008)

Notes:
  • The text of Guillaume Apollinaire's "Chanson du mal-aimé" can be found in Alcools. 1913. Trans. Anne Hyde Greet. Foreword by Warren Ramsey (Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1966).







Che miri o sciocco questa mia pittura Di tanti al viver nostro atti stromenti, E fai nel tuo pensier vari argomenti, Imagine non è, non è figura. Egli è di condir cibi alma fattura, Che à Prencipi, e gran Regi, in Oro, e Argenti Commune serve, e a tutte l’altre genti Tolti a le giande, e a la vil lor pastura. Perciò e ben degno ch’in metalli, e ’n marmi Non che in carta si stampi, e che si dica Questo per human uso è fatto essempio. Quindi Natura a l’Arte adombrar parmi, Che per bisogno si fe’ a l’arte amica, Lungi dal suo costime antico, et empio.
Look at the picture dumb-ass of all that useful gear if you’re looking for a purpose you won’t find it here Everyone princes peasants kings eats from the same dish the genius is in the things not their maker’s wish It’s fitting then to print them on metal not on card As use follows exemplum So Nature copies Art Now Nature’s turned into Art’s slave time to clam up and behave – Giuseppe Arcimbaldo, Cucina (1569)


(30/9-13/12/99)

Publications:
  • Nights with Giordano Bruno. R.E.M. Trilogy 1. ISBN 0-9582225-0-9 (Wellington: Bumper Books, 2000): 150.
  • "Kings of Infinite Space." Nights with Giordano Bruno (2008)

Notes:
  • The Italian text of this poem can be found printed under Arcimbaldo's print here.










(23/10-19/11/98)

Publications:
  • Nights with Giordano Bruno. R.E.M. Trilogy 1. ISBN 0-9582225-0-9 (Wellington: Bumper Books, 2000): 152.
  • "Vampires Suck." Nights with Giordano Bruno (2008)







The Night Annora Read


The city is a hermetic jewel
built of correspondences
looking through George Court’s
grille
       no nothing

Silence is a good thing
moving against the sky
(… never went to see
that Roger Hall comedy)
 
Francis jangles on the keys
    you look for Bruno
   in the candle-flames
  – pessimistic gnosis –
     think, alas, of


(3/11/99)

Publications:
  • Three Poems for Annora Gollop, on the Occasion of Her Birthday [pamphlet] (February 26, 2000).
  • Nights with Giordano Bruno. R.E.M. Trilogy 1. ISBN 0-9582225-0-9 (Wellington: Bumper Books, 2000): 211 & 215.
  • "Magus." Nights with Giordano Bruno (2008)






Jack Ross: Game for One Player (2004)







The Imaginary Museum of Atlantis. R.E.M. Trilogy 2. ISBN 0-9582586-8-6. Auckland: Titus Books, 2006. 164 pp.







(after C. P. Cavafy)


Before you set out for Ithaka
pray for a long itinerary
full of protracted stopovers.
Customs officials, Interpol,
the zombie Police Chief – not a problem:
as long as you keep your shit together,
staple a smile to your fat face,
they won’t be able to finger you.
Customs officials, Interpol,
the paparazzi, will look right through you
– unless you invite them up for a drink,
unless they’re already inside your head.

Pray for a long itinerary:
landing for the umpteenth time
on the tarmac of a third-world airport
at fiery psychedelic dawn;
haggling in the duty-frees
for coral necklaces and pearls,
designer scents & silks & shades,
as many marques as you can handle; 
visiting every provincial town,
sampling every drug & kick …
Never forget about Ithaka:
getting there is your destiny;
no need to rush – it’ll still be waiting
no matter how many years you take.
By the time you touch down you’ll be stuffed,
happy with what you snapped in transit,
just a few daytrips left to do.
Ithaka shouted you the trip,
you’d never have travelled without her.
She’s got fuck-all to show you now.

Dirt-poor, dingy … she’s up front.
It’s over now; you’ve seen so much
there’s no need to tell you what Ithaka means.


(30/8-12/10/04)




Publications:
  • Tongue in Your Ear 8 (2005): [42].
  • Poetry Live & four-by-two publishing (1/4/05)
  • The Imaginary Museum of Atlantis. R.E.M. Trilogy 2. ISBN 0-9582586-8-6. (Auckland: Titus Books, 2006): [36].
  • "Ithaka". Where am I? Cuttings (4/2/08).











Jack Ross: E M O (2008)


E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3. Auckland: Titus Books, 2008. 264 pp.







I

Welcome
    to the new reality
Nothing’s stranger
    than the will
    to survive

Wild geese draw lines
    across an amber sky
fish bask
    in frozen rivers
    generators die


II

Inheritor of silence
    shall I be?
Black mass below us
above us only
    sky

Hello hell
    the weight of matter
tells us
better
    stop


(5/6-14/7/05 / 10/4-14/7/05)

Publications:
  • Magazine 3 (2005) [Aotearoa – Fernland – New Zealand]: 126.
  • "E M O." EVA AVE; Moons of Mars & Ovid in Otherworld (2006)
  • E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 3, 91 & 175.
  • "Site-map." EMO (2024)







The first metaphor is the river –
father of waters. The living crystal
guarding those miracles
which were Islam’s, but now are
yours and mine: The kick-ass
talisman doubling as a slave;
the genie jammed inside a jar
by Solomon’s seal; that King’s command
to give his one-night stand
the chop – matching a lunar beauty
with the white sheen of the sword;
washing your hands with ashes;
the voyages of Sindbad, that Ulysses
inspired by the thrill of risk
not punished by a god; the magic lamp;
the signs that showed Rodrigo
the Moors conquering Spain;
the ape who proved he was a man
by winning at chess; the leprous king;
tall caravans; the magnetic
mountain that collects ships;
the sheikh and the gazelle; a fluid orb
of forms changing like clouds,
subject to Destiny – or Chance
(the same thing, in effect);
the beggar who could be an angel
and the cave called Sesame.
   The second metaphor is the web
of a tapestry, which looks up close
like a chaos of colours and arbitrary
lines, a dizzying expanse
of chance – but secret laws delimit it.
Just like that other dream, the Universe,
the Book of the Nights is made up
of master-numbers and motifs:
seven brothers and seven voyages,
three Kazis and three wishes
for whoever sees the Night of Nights,
the dark-haired beauty in whose arms
the lover watches three whole nights,
three Wazirs and three punishments,
and, behind all the others, that first
and final number of the Lord: the One.
   The third metaphor is a dream
woven by Persians and Muslims
in the courtyards of the veiled East
or in orchard closes turned to dust.
People will keep dreaming it
till the end of time. As in
the Eleatic paradox, the dream
divides into another dream
and then another, and so on,
entwining in a static labyrinth.
In this book is the Book. The careless
Queen tells the King their own
half-forgotten story. Distracted
by the din of past enchantments
they forget who they are ... and dream.
   The fourth metaphor is a map
of that indefinable region, Time,
which measures the pace of shadows
and the slow erosion of marble
and the tread of the generations.
Everything. The voice and the echo –
that vision of Janus, two-faced god –
worlds of silver and worlds of gold
and the vast vigil of the stars.
The Arabs say no-one can ever
read right through the Book of the Nights.
The Nights are Time, which never sleeps.
Keep reading as the day declines and
Scheherazade will tell you your own story.

    – Jorge Luis Borges, "Metáforas de Las Mil y 
    Una Noches." Historia de la noche (1977)


(30/6/95-2/8/03)

Publications:
  • "Metaphors of The 1001 Nights." Magazine 1 (2003): 36-38.
  • "Metaphors of The 1001 Nights." Scheherazade's Web (16/9/06)
  • "EVA AVE." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 30.

Notes:
  • The Spanish text Of Jorge Luis Borges' "Metáforas de Las Mil y Una Noches", from Historia de la noche (1977), can be found in Obras Completas. 1974. 3 vols (Buenos Aires: Emecé Editores, 1990): 3: 163-203.







The cicadas were loud that year
stubbed round the house
    we pecked at scraps
from a pizza box

I saw the harbour gleaming
like a tooth    the filaments
unravelling
            your eyes
in the window
    like a wolf

Looting was unforeseen
    the infantry
would mop that up

The integers squared away
the indigiens sealed
up    in their stupor
plastic box


(20-23/3/03)

Publications:
  • Tupelo Hotel: Winter Readings at Tupelo. Ed. Mark Pirie. ISBN 1-86942-046-2. Paekakariki: Earl of Seacliff Art Workshop, 2004: 30-31.
  • "Burmese Days." Moons of Mars (2006)
  • "Moons of Mars." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 108.
  • "Burmese Days." EMO (2024)







MADCHK
– licence plate


ORIENTAL PARADE 


The purse of you
    tight-lipped
bike shorts
    goose-pimples
Attention aux marins
    sorry, sailors

Who so needs a hug?

•	

BRENTWOOD HOTEL	


Hoofing it?
    slow down
The little darlings
    one kick & you’re out
dream girl    stroke stroke
    the secret garden

Run away to sea

•	

FINISHING SCHOOL	


Was her name Shannon?
    no, Fallon
on Dynasty    you know
    the slutty one
Time to lay some pipe
    he chortles    simpers, rather

Three fillies one mare


(24/11-2/12/01)

Publications:
  • City Poems: with Compliments of the Season [pamphlet] (December 16, 2001)
  • "Trois filles de leur mère." Moons of Mars (2006)
  • "Moons of Mars." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 121-22.
  • "Trois filles de leur mère." EMO (2024)







Girl of the wood-ember hair
flash-photo wit
hourglass waist
otter-cub in the tiger’s jaws
bouquet of sunflowers in your mouth
teeth white mice tracks in the snow
teased-amber tongue
tongue stained blood-red by the Host
tongue of a Barbie batting her eyelids
alchemist’s tongue
lashes crayon slashes
swallowtail eyebrows
forehead fogged-up
greenhouse panes
champagne-flute shoulders
– dolphins butting through sea-ice –
matchstick wrists
card-sharp fingers    my Ace of Hearts
harvest-shock fingers
marten-fur armpits
(Midsummer bonfires
of blackbirds’ nests)
spindrift arms
ground fine as grain
skyrocket legs
sparking like clockwork    or despair
calves shoots from the Rata tree
feet like initials
feet like keyrings    feet like bung-taps
pearl-barley neck
whitewater throat    (my love-nest
in the torrent’s bed)
night-walking breasts
sea-otter breasts
crucified breasts
rosebud nipples spiked with dew
belly like a folded fan
a giant claw
your back    a jump-jet hovering
quicksilver back
beacon back
nuque of the neck    a rolling stone
a glass that shatters in your hand
coracle hips
flared hips
pale as a peacock
tipped head-over-heels
asbestos bum
swansdown behind
Spring booty
leaf-dagger sex
sex panning for gold    platypus pussy
sex soft as anemone    jujube sweet
mirror sex
eyes pricked with tears
violet eyes    my magnetic north
nomad eyes
eyes water to a dying man
eyes one second from the chop
eyes deep as a well    eyes free as air    eyes dry earth and eyes
                                                        cool fire
 
– André Breton


(20/11/04-25/4/05)

Publications:
  • Magazine 3 (2005) [Aotearoa – Fernland – New Zealand]: 25-29.
  • "Jack Ross." OBAN 06 Online Poetry Anthology. nzpec (28 April 2006).
  • "Free Love." Moons of Mars (2006)
  • "Moons of Mars." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 152-53.
  • "Free Love." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • The text of "L'Union libre", by André Breton, from Clair de terre (1931), can be found in La poésie surréaliste: Édition revue et augmentée. Ed. Jean-Louis Bédouin. 1964 (Paris: Éditions Seghers, 1970): 82-84.
  • Extracted from André Breton's Clair de terre, 1931.







The wind proposed to the snow. The snow and the wind plighted their 
troth, and a frost-fingered ship probed the pack-ice of their love. 
A bowsprit probed their season of intimacy.
    Happiness is frozen in the froth of a cloud; it’s a light which 
freezes, then cracks. It’s a thicket of lilies infested with violet 
snakes, gliding between twilight and the sea, gliding across the 
blood-red lawns of twilight.
    The whip cracks, streaking the snow of your first love. The wild 
beast falls asleep in a blood-streaked orchid.

– Maurice Blanchard


(14-26/8/99)

Publications:
  • Three Surrealist Poems, for the Engagement of Lisa Bieleski & Kendall Clements (Auckland: Perdrix Press, 1999).
  • "Marriage." The Wooden Propeller: Egypt – Australia – New Zealand – Paris – Mexico – New York (15-16/10/06).
  • "Marriage." Moons of Mars (2006)
  • "Moons of Mars." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 159.
  • "Marriage." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • The text of "Noces", by Maurice Blanchard, from Le Monde qui nous entoure (1951), can be found in La poésie surréaliste: Édition revue et augmentée. Ed. Jean-Louis Bédouin. 1964 (Paris: Éditions Seghers, 1970): 74.







He said:    my hoarse lips pant spotted
panthers who sing
sweeter than bellbirds in the bush
or the blood-streaked bulls of storm cumulus
He said:
Inside me I’ve got
steep salt waves
breaking over (so dainty) feast-day flowers
He called Our Lady
a little girl with a basket of vegetables
He said:        Then he said:
I’m a poppy
clashing at dawn with pale blue animals

– Jacques Baron


(14-17/8/99)

Publications:
  • Three Surrealist Poems, for the Engagement of Lisa Bieleski & Kendall Clements (Auckland: Perdrix Press, 1999).
  • "The Stranger." The Wooden Propeller: Egypt – Australia – New Zealand – Paris – Mexico – New York (15-16/10/06).
  • "Marriage." Moons of Mars (2006)
  • "Moons of Mars." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 160.
  • "Marriage." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • The text of "L'Inconnu", by Jacques Baron, from L'Allure poétique (1924), can be found in La poésie surréaliste: Édition revue et augmentée. Ed. Jean-Louis Bédouin. 1964 (Paris: Éditions Seghers, 1970): 64.





Ovid in Otherworld


The notion that Ovid was never relegated to Tomis at all, but — in a very real sense an exul ludens [laughing, playful exile] — spent his latter years in Rome toying with ever more elaborate exilic topoi (presumably as an excuse for not finishing the Fasti and not revising the Metamorphoses …), remains fundamentally bizarre. Just how bizarre can be appreciated when we try to envisage the Realien [facts, realities] of such a project and the reaction to it of friends and critics. Ovid’s real exile may not have provoked (surviving) contemporary comment, but so ludicrous a piece of monotonous and obsessional playacting … most certainly would have done so.

[Ovid. The Poems of Exile: Tristia and the Black Sea Letters, with a new foreword. Translated with an introduction, notes and glossary by Peter Green. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005. x.]


Publications:
  • "Exul ludens." Ovid in Otherworld (30/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 188.
  • "Exul ludens." EMO (2024)







Nec mihi, quod lusi uero sine crimine, prodest,
    quodque magis uita Musa iocata mea est


I fucked around in poetry
    not life
        bookworm

pale as putty
    the voyage nearly killed me
        storms

& seasickness & crap
    to eat 
        but I survived it

all
    why? I
        cry

like snow in spring


(12/7-15/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 3.2." Ovid in Otherworld (15/8/06)
  • "from Ovid in Otherworld: Versions from Tristia: Tristia 3.2, 3.3 & 3.10.” JAAM 25 (2008): 142-44.
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 177.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 3.2." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Nec caelum patior, nec aquis adsueuimus istis,
    terraque nescioquo non placet ipsa modo


Why is this not my writing?
I’m dictating

to my landlady today
too sick to hold a pen

no hospitals up here
no friends to visit

grapes & gossip
I think of you

keep talking to you
even in delirium

(or so they tell me)
if you were here

then I’d get up
to greet you

unless you’re happier
without me?

No – I know
that’s just not you

I can still make you sad


(13/7-27/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 3.3." Ovid in Otherworld (27/8/06)
  • "from Ovid in Otherworld: Versions from Tristia: Tristia 3.2, 3.3 & 3.10.” JAAM 25 (2008): 142-44.
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 183.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 3.3." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







ut tetigi Pontum, uexant insomnia, uixque
    ossa tegit macies nec iuuat ora cibus


Since I arrived
in Otherworld

I can’t sleep
anymore

I’ve starved myself
until my skin’s

like parchment
flaking off

like autumn leaves
my mind’s the same

it all comes down
to one defect

the wrong address 


(18/7-27/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 3.8." Ovid in Otherworld (27/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 189.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 3.8." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







suppositum stellis numquam tangentibus aequor
    me sciat in media uiuere barbaria


If anyone still remembers me
back in the city

think of a wheel of stars
that never sink

below the ocean
think of the far bank of a river

our only shield
against rampaging gangs

Black Power    Headhunters
no faxes no email

for days
the lines are down

the snow once fallen
lies a second year

here wine bursts bottles
they don’t drink beer

but ice-cubes
I’ve seen the whole sea

frozen hard
walked on it dry-shod

the deep ringing beneath me 


(11/7-27/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 3.10." Ovid in Otherworld (27/8/06)
  • "from Ovid in Otherworld: Versions from Tristia: Tristia 3.2, 3.3 & 3.10.” JAAM 25 (2008): 142-44.
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 197.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 3.10." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Iam uiolam puerique legunt hilaresque puellae,
    rustica quae nullo nata serente uenit

Come gather flowers laughing children from the unploughed earth spring comes even to Otherworld buds break out where they can few trees no vines no carts crossing the river ships come with news from home have I been pardoned yet?


(13/7-27/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 3.12." Ovid in Otherworld (27/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 204.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 3.12." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Si tamen est aliquid nobis hac luce petendum,
    in loca ne redeas amplius ista, precor


It’s my birthday
today

why was I born
at all?

killing time
far from my country

I hope this day
will never

come again
not here

at least 


(13/7-27/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 3.13." Ovid in Otherworld (27/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 211.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 3.13." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







En pudet et fateor, iam desuetudine longa
    uix subeunt ipsi uerba Latina mihi


D’you want to know
about the people here?

their clothes their manners?
they carry weapons

all of them
the locals

barely civilised
colonials

gone native
longhaired bearded

jackknives
at the ready

I’m scarred enough
not to be scared

of them
can follow

their argot
(hardly call to mind

my own words now) 


(13/7-28/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 5.7." Ovid in Otherworld (28/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 219.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 5.7." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Stare putes adeo procedunt tempora tarde,
    et peragit lentis passibus annus iter


Three years I’ve been here now
three times the sea has

frozen thawed again
time passes in reverse

up here (it seems)
the shortest day

lasts longer than
the longest night

at home
nowhere is safe

the gangs descend
in migratory flocks

to test our walls
we gather cartridge cases

in the streets
like grain

farmers wear helmets
sheep fear war

not predators
I have to talk in signs

even to neighbours
here I’m the simpleton

nodding
as they mock me

to my face 


(13/7-28/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 5.10." Ovid in Otherworld (28/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 228-29.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 5.10." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Sic utinam, quae nil metuentem tale magistrum
    perdidit, in cineres Ars mea uersa foret


        You tell me I should work
    not kick
against the pricks

        it’s harder
    than you think
since song for me means

        joy
    laughing
at the funeral

        dancing
    at the wake
is what you ask

        of me
    & if I could forget it all
my life my country

        you
    I don’t have time
or peace of mind

        to think up stories
    I’m not the man I was
I keep on writing

        but
    when I reread it
ashes in the grate

        is all
    it’s worth
I should have started

doing that before


(13/7-28/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Tristia 5.12." Ovid in Otherworld (28/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 233-34.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Tristia 5.12." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Qui, mortis saeuo geminent ut uulnere causas,
    omnia uipereo spicula felle linunt.


Maximus
why am I writing you?
you’ll throw away the letter

when you see my name
up here
the locals smear their blades

with poison
to up the chances
of a fatal wound

circling the walls like wolves
the rooftops gleam
with last year’s crop of shrapnel

as my fourth winter
stretches into spring
no rest for me

even in dreams
I’m riddled
like a target

sweating on the chaingang
or worst of all
I dream I’m

safe at home 


(14/7-29/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Epistulae 1.2." Ovid in Otherworld (29/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 238.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Epistulae 1.2." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







man boldly goes where most courageous not step
    – Chandra


Leap in the dark
or fall back
    into fire

Pick up your pen
& scribble
    round & round & round

Hot stony
& exclusive
    vacant of all holy

“Hypnagogia –
most common features
    vividness

& fear”
until you’re sure
    that floating hand
	
the spider
rabbits
    nest of rutting cats

have your best interests
at heart
    bat them away
	
into tomorrow


(15-29/6/06)

Publications:
  • Poetry NZ 33 (2006): 80.
  • "Sleep Threshold - Hypnagogia." Ovid in Otherworld (3/10/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 242.
  • "Sleep Threshold - Hypnagogia." EMO (2024)







Vincitur Aegisos testataque tempus in omne
    sunt tua, Vestalis, carmine facta meo.


Vestalis
you’ve been posted here yourself
to the land of the midnight sun

to police the Hyperboreans
below the pole
you know that I’m not lying

you can see the ice
the frozen bottles
bikies

racing their hogs
along the floes
you’ve seen the poisoned nunchucks

had to fight yourself
when the stockade was attacked
(your deeds will live forever

in my verse)


(14/7-30/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Epistulae 4.7." Ovid in Otherworld (30/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 243.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Epistulae 4.7." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Ecquos tu silices, ecquod, carissime, ferrum
    duritiae confers, Albinouane, meae?


This is my sixth
summer
Albovinanus

who’d have guessed
I’d last here
for so long?

water
carves out stone
fingers

wear gold rings
to ribbons
given time

but I’m untouched
a leafless land
that only grows

barbed wire
where rafts turn into
footpaths

on the sea


(14/7-30/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Epistulae 4.10." Ovid in Otherworld (30/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 247.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Epistulae 4.10." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







Haec tibi mittuntur, quem sum modo carmine questus
    non aptum numeris nomen habere meis


Tuticanus
– what a name!
I can’t think what to say to you except

get me out of here
anything would be better
Mt Purgatory

Guantanamo Bay
Iraq
the locals have got tired

of hearing me complain
yes once again
my work’s got me in trouble

& once again
I’m innocent
I like them

I just hate the place we’re in
admittedly I moan about the cold
the sieges

gunfights
gangmembers
but never a word against

my gentle hosts
they won’t let me pay taxes
call me their poet

far kinder
than you people
if only they lived further

from the pole 


(14/7-30/8/06)

Publications:
  • "Epistulae 4.14." Ovid in Otherworld (30/8/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 252-53.
  • Traffic in Gold (Montana Poetry Day, January 13, 2008). Music by Anna Rugis / Poetry by Jack Ross. Audio CD: 77 minutes. Auckland: Auckland Art Gallery, 2009.
  • "Epistulae 4.14." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • Texts and literal translations for these versions from Ovid are available in Ovid: Tristia. Ex Ponto. Trans. Arthur Leslie Wheeler. 1924. Loeb Classics. London: William Heinemann / Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953.







ritus erit veteris, nocturna Lemuria, sacri:
    inferias tacitis manibus illa dabunt


May
Ghost feast
Lemuria

make offerings
to all the ghosts
at midnight

when dogs
& cocks
are fast asleep

walk barefoot
thumb
pressed through

your fingers
warding off
the hungry dead

wash your hands
in pure spring water
turn

& throw
black beans
away

9 x
face averted
say

I cleanse my house
the shade
walking behind you

wash your hands
again
& bang

a gong
9 x
ask all souls

to leave your house
go away
ghost elders

go


(27-28/9/06)

Publications:
  • "Fasti V: 421-44." Ovid in Otherworld (28/9/06)
  • "Ovid in Otherworld." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 254-55.
  • "Fasti V: 421-44." EMO (2024)

Notes:
  • A text and literal translation for this version from Ovid is available in Ovid: Fasti. Trans. J. G. Frazer. 1931. Loeb Classics. Cambridge: Harvard University Press / London: William Heinemann, 1959.







I am the monkey of the Lord
he said
What can you want 
from me?

4 silvereyes
3 barstools
2 palmtrees
a golden ring

& no more strain


(10/8/07)

Publications:
  • "Jack's Metamorphoses: Collage Poems & Sequences (1997-2007)." E M O. R.E.M. Trilogy 3. ISBN 978-1-877441-07-3 (Auckland: Titus Books, 2008): 183.






Jack Ross: E M O (2008)







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