The Wise Men

The Wise Men

The Magi travelled to Palestine
on camels and a government
grant from the Parthian Empire.

Cheated in the camel market,
loaded high with scientific gear
and a few gifts from the royal store;
they let theory guide observation.

Herod got his Brains Trust on
the job, and provided some
peer review; and off went the three
nerds, to follow the Star to Bethlehem.

And “when they saw the star,
they rejoiced with exceeding
great joy”; because their calculations
were correct, and their funding
justified, and their report to
the Imperial Chief Scientist
would write itself.

God sent an angel like a Divine
email to warn them not to return
to Herod to share their exciting
ground-truthed data, because
they needed to be told the obvious.

Julian O’Dea

Pet Garden

She planted lavender, and bees
fell upon it like a sunshower;
and shrubs for dappled shade;
and let crazy daisies grow.

Creatures of innocence came
to the garden in their last hour,
tasting grass one more time,
or pouncing on a final moving
flower.

Julian O’Dea

The Surf

The surf is full of girls:
their seaweed, oysters,
and pink pearls.

 

Julian O’Dea

SECOND LIFE

SECOND LIFE

Shrimp swim again in sauce,
rare steaks bleed, vegetables
sprout in earthen plates,
fish slide from frypans
over throats like waterfalls,
potatoes sink back to the dark
soil of bellies; all living again
for gourmet or trencherman.

 

 

Julian O’Dea

LINES ON A DEAD PET

LINES ON A DEAD PET

He might be asleep,
curled up like that,
and what is one more
sadness in a world
like this?
Perhaps one tear
to wet the piece of cloth
you will wrap him in,
and shiny pebbles to be
his grave goods,
and a little grass to fade
with him into the earth.

 

Julian O’Dea

Today

Today

I woke up in a parallel world
this morning;
I am calling it Today.
Everything is slightly different,
older;
as if I had travelled in time.

I am not quite the same.
Nobody is.
Some people have unaccountably
disappeared;
into the earth, they say.

And there are some new people,
it says in the paper,
and cars I haven't seen before
on the road.

The clouds have changed;
it is all so strange.




Julian O'Dea

The Best Dog

The Best Dog

Like a big friendly dog by my side,
even in winter the sun warms me
through the window, lolling around 
all day, never rising high in the sky,
counting the hours, waiting to return
to his night-time kennel; a golden
retriever, leaving his moon ball out
at night.

Julian O’Dea