The Burning

The sun is a burning magnet on the water.
Durable, our boat is a sizable pretzel in the arms of the bay.
Warmth with contortion, the clash of passions
tug the funnelled swooned water.

Greenery, that inlet of the ocean,
lies precarious and submerged.
Life, subsidized by water,
is within its hope, bubbling in embers,
froth drunk with suds
hammered against the boat's edge.

What is this, this sky
home of the transparent sun.
Blue agony,
burning up with delerium,
the wet pastel illusion slides against our craniums.

Crass, crass the movement of the waves
across a low bow, excessively pleasant.
All the more
troubled vistas
blue with hegemony over earth,
drowsiness dropping a plague of lapping edges;
a strength pried from graves.
This sea of ours sags, heaves in deep
displacement, fulfills my liquid caress.

Paul Cameron Brown

Paul Cameron Brown is a Canadian poet known for his extensive work in both poetry and art criticism. Born in western Canada, Brown has had a prolific career in writing, often intertwining themes of human experience and nature. His works have been showcased in various literary magazines and anthologies. With a style that is both reflective and evocative, he has gained recognition not only in Canada but also internationally.

Paul Cameron Brown

The Spoken Word

Paul Cameron Brown, Simple Poetry

Lavender

Paul Cameron Brown, Simple Poetry

Smokestack

Paul Cameron Brown, Simple Poetry

Rowing With Crayons

Paul Cameron Brown, Simple Poetry

English

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Tide Charts

    To create dream -
    the pearl thru wine effect,
    oil and vinegar viscidity
    of giant salad leaves
    basking on the
    broken picnic table
    like so many lemurs
    taken to a
    Malagasy forest.

    Liverwurst on rye,
    cuff-links drag
    the hard, mica table;
    so, why be afraid
    'cause spume from waves
    glows upward
    in so many trails of
    grey-laden smoke?

    This island looks like a loaf,
    a dot or mole on inviting cheeks,
    to me; so wary, invariably, of land
    (and perhaps the Sand Man)
    amongst all those wandering eyes,
    especially the sea-scape,
    curl of snake
    illuminated
    in a sudden, tropic shower.

    See the sudden bandanna ...

Paul Cameron Brown

Ahoy

    Image throttled in the subconscious,
    romantic throwback -
    the mind on a voyage round land's end
    to eclipse pyramidal fires
    set as beacons along rock strewn shores -
    her skeletal inhabitants on ice flows
    wrapped in bearskins
    with dirks between their teeth
    slapping one another to keep warm.

    Then, alpine ranges carrying
    the plight of the Andes in their mouth;
    a dull, white sail propped against ship's bow
    with a noise like an anvil
    coming loose in the brain.

    More frightening, sailors mutiny on a diet
    of bread as sallow maggots
    march in a quarter horse sized trot
    across the floorboards.
    Such men in the bellows of one's mind
    break out rubber dinghies
    i...

Paul Cameron Brown

Stillness

    Invitingly, the sea shines her stars,
    captive flames within an impatient heart
    as darkness loads the pleasent isles with coarseness,
    slow sparks rise over a roaring fire.

    And strolling beaches near dawn
    when the sand fleas & crabs are seen to flee,
    one catches upon the imperfect stillness
    a song of one - wind with sea
    drawning near
    inward, such stars turn
    as bonds at last
    worked free.

Paul Cameron Brown

Offerings (A Movement In Four Parts)

The night is folly without the moon,
trees blank space against a frontal sky
where lattice work from a bled fish reveals
skeletal markings will not administer
the red jack of hearts to a mistress sea.

Most fickle, the ways of a cockroach
(I don't recommend them) to offerings
of white linen, cold squares atop
a stone diamonded floor.

Palaver shacks drone in ghostly light
communicating some message about eel runs
up the black river, the equivalent brush
of tombstones against dark nightsoil.

Tiny bars open as cubicles.
proverbial flashes of the coming evening,
haciendas to count every blessing.

The road to such places
snarls a dusty pleasure
and will heat thin blood
to boil in the daylight hours.

II

Swe...

Paul Cameron Brown

Casting Rocks

    Merely on edge,
    the wharf in bad light
    clinging to water's ledge -
    a loon from afar
    the Woods
    closing with each sound.

    Casting rocks toward moon's glare
    lapidations laughing back,
    the treacle of warm night
    coaxing fire's glowing might.

    Sudden, oceanic wilderness
    breathless in barked silence -
    and camphor to keep the flies at distance,
    the anchored boat like a prison ship
    dallying on the waves,
    brambles & underbrush
    sunken wet sand,
    abundant berries rasp in thickets -
    the cottage like a jar
    closing for the night.

Paul Cameron Brown

The Waters Of The Bay Lie Beneath

    An abandoned house -
    dark salved to eclectic;
    crinkly, black pigment of old pine boards
    disparate to the elements.

    The waters of the bay lie beneath.
    A long slope trailing back of brush,
    garbles stones hoarse
    in the throat of a dust-flecked field
    are made more barren
    by the skunk cabbage weeds,
    the ugly, flotsam cloaks
    of horse hair to the neck -
    a hair shirt, coddling abrupt the barren pain
    tilled from empty soil.

    The summer's heat.
    Nameless insect waifs
    wavering, adjusting tumult
    to straighten the tight air
    about the outward door frame.
    Pinched in windows, glass in
    refugee lots billowing about
    urine paper;
    nails a ruddy pick

Paul Cameron Brown