JOHNMICHAEL SIMON POETRY

Upon the ancient waters floats a fossil

and in a pockmarked crater lies a scrap

of rust adhering to some burnt out evidence

which when collected crumbles into dust

 

Their finest brains and microscopes confounded

the emperor calls a halt to further search

and with his tentacle inscribes conclusion

no life ever existed on planet earth

 

A trillion light years pass and with them

monarch search and tentacles die too

then one day in a galaxy called nowhere

a child squints through a crystal tube and views

 

Look parent m look what I’ve discovered

look when you hold this glass against both moons

you see some strange deformed inscription

written across a nebula’s balloon

 

What does it mean oh parent I still see it

a message flickering across a sphere

look when you close five eyes and leave one open

the writing sharpens – “Kilroy was here”