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Deadly Pollen

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About This Book

A sequence of poems moves between mythic and contemporary scenes, juxtaposing ancient ruins, urban infrastructure and war-torn landscapes to examine memory, cultural inheritance, and modern indifference. Imagery ranges from stupas and stone circles to sewer plans, satellites and drifting dust, while recurring motifs of sun, pollen, scent and bees bind personal reflection to political violence and environmental decay. Formal play includes parodies, lyrical address and fragmented narrative, producing a restless meditation on loss, belonging and the persistence of cultural and physical ruins.

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Title: Deadly Pollen

Author: Stephen Oliver

Release date: March 1, 2004 [eBook #11522]
Most recently updated: October 28, 2024

Language: English

Credits: Stephen Oliver

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DEADLY POLLEN ***

Deadly Pollen

by Stephen Oliver

WORD RIOT PRESS



(c) Stephen Oliver, 2003

Books by Stephen Oliver

Henwise (1975)
& Interviews (1978)
Autumn Songs (1978)
Letter To James K. Baxter (1980)
Earthbound Mirrors (1984)
Guardians, Not Angels (1993)
Islands of Wilderness - A Romance (1996)
Unmanned (1999)
Election Year Blues (1999)
Night of Warehouses: Poems 1978 - 2000 (2001)
Deadly Pollen (2003)
Ballads, Satire & Salt (2003)

Recordings

Earthbound Mirrors, a selection, Stephen Oliver,
Ode Records Label, Auckland, (cassette) 1984


For more information on Stephen Oliver visit:
http://people.smartchat.net.au/~sao/

Cover design: Pina Ricciu.
Cover image: The Lithuanian Bison,
engraving from J. von Brincken, 1828.

Acknowledgements: Antipodes (USA), Biff’s Quarterly (USA), Brief (NZ),
Catalyzer Journal (USA), Comet Magazine (San Francisco), JAAM (NZ),
Poetry NZ/26 featured poet, San Francisco Salvo, Spreadhead (USA),
Thylazine (Aust).

An Actual Encounter With the Sun On / My Balcony At France Street: a
parody on Frank O’Hara’s ‘A True Account Of Talking / To The Sun At
Fire Island’ who in turn based his account on Mayakovsky’s more robust
poem, ‘A Most Extraordinary Adventure’. POETS’ PALACE: a name given by
the author to an old Kauri, weatherboard guest house in France Street
(the upper story of which he occupied in the early ’80s) near the
prostitute’s strip off K’rd, Auckland. Various ‘emerging’ poets &
artists lived downstairs at intervals during this period. As the last
of its kind in Newton Gully this 100 year old wooden building was
finally demolished at the close of the decade.

Deadly Pollen is published by

Word Riot Press
PO Box 414
Middletown, NJ 07748
USA
http://www.wordriot.org/press

ISBN 0-9728200-2-7

Typeset by Word Riot Press in Bembo





Contents

1. ‘ZIONISM:’
2. ‘You return to the stupa, yearly,’
3. ‘The stones collected. Ground’
4. ‘ “With digital, there is no past,” ’
5. ‘How is it the floating island’
6. ‘Mediocre raiders lie in wait.’
7. ‘Time passes - that pressure in’
8. ‘Hugely, our indifference squats -’
9. ‘Circuit; right hand wise,’
10. ‘If streets had cobblestones’
11. ‘A Public Works draughtsman’
12. ‘Pyrrha, your dewy hair,’
13. ‘The flames above the wall,’
14. ‘Once cradle of civilization -’
15. ‘Forty thousand tons. Space’
16. ‘A giallo antico moon framed’
17. ‘‘The Breaking of Nations’ ’
18. ‘‘A line is taking a full-stop’
19. ‘Buildings off the crustal shelf,’
20. ‘Generalization of Old World’
21. ‘CEOs in castles cascade’
22. ‘Footprints for satellites?’
23. ‘Is recollection seeing anew,’
24. ‘So. Earth’s most dramatic’
25. ‘I wanted to reach my hand into’
26. ‘ ‘Your breasts in the mirror,’ ’
27. ‘Alcatraz not Minoan ruins.’
28. ‘Do words bring to mind flat’
29. ‘Serpent-backed bridge profiled:’
30. ‘One quadrant of sky turns,’
31. ‘Barrel of the sun, gun-wad,’
32. ‘Rubbed off sky exposes an’
33. ‘The day combustible as a’
34. ‘Compression of bees,’
35. ‘Scent makes the air visible,’
An Actual Encounter With The Sun On
My Balcony At France Street