I Want the Teeth of
This was originally posted in Osho News
An A-lister, the shiniest white fence of dashing
gnashers money can buy
I want to blind you with my bleached
life-bones glossy and laser-beaming
white as the light from a thousand Buddhas
to show you the way at night
Searchlight teeth, everlasting
to show me my father’s love
hidden under a rock
I want the teeth of
a world-chomper, money dashing in like popcorn,
I just open my mouth and close it again
and my teeth parse and shred and penetrate
the bank-vault, the upper echelon
to let its silly riches
pour down
And then my teeth winnow through the grubby mess
of greed-lives
and deliver white goodness to help both me and the world
I want the teeth of the storm
So that when I die I go leaping and
awestruck
into the utterly uncontrollable
I want the teeth of the dog that bit me
The fat sharp no-nonsense teeth
that nip into interlopers, or at least into their intentions,
and send them bleating away
knowing that they can’t fucking bother
or scold or judge or deny or twist or muscle
or press on me with all kinds of nonsense.
Yeah
I want those teeth
You just look at them and know
you’d better account for yourself here
smartly
or hie yourself away, hands on your ass
while my teeth make little clicking sounds
behind you
I want the teeth of the Himalayan snows
winking at God
The stars’ white mouths
shining and grinning
I want the teeth of a dancer biting a long red rose
as she turns, turns
and you just see the wink, wink
of the whiteness
as she whirls faster and faster,
it’s Morse code, piano keys,
a message from the Sufis, the Funky Chicken,
Aphrodite,
from Outer Space, from heartbeat,
faster, faster,
until we laugh and all fall down
I want the teeth of daisies
Sometimes white soft petals
are your words
I want the teeth of a well-ordered universe
instead of a random handful
of dice
And yet I love the dice
hard and white
with eyes in them
Random, clicking,
longing for strength
Yet all to bits with so much space between them
Dice shouting
leaping
dancing all askew
I want the teeth I was given
and upon which I’ve wrought improvements
as I climb out from behind the fence
dreaming of perfect centering
Where is it
Inside which bones
2019, Hebden Bridge