False prophecy is boom-or-bust business
just mind your own and make your bank
while another today refuses to wait
and another tonight is running late
nine to five to seven to eleven again
nothing but time for waiting in line
live your best life at the traffic lights
they say
no rest for the wicked
they say
you bought the ticket
they say
it’s a sticky wicket
but I say
we were fucking tricked.

Throwing a self-pity party
My place! Today!
Dress code: utterly ridiculous
b.y.o. tiny violin.

Watch this space as they say
restart the infernal machine
when the tide turns and returns
lay my burden aside
in the blessings of another rainy day
remember that I’m alive
and it’s back to work in cleaner shirts
knuckle to keyboard
bumper to bumper
from warehouse to the front-of-store killing floor
shift it all and sell it all and shift it back again
my vacation in my self-centered stagnation is done
(for now)
back to work we go.

Boundless
enthusiasm
you nearly pulled me over
again.

Every morning you woke up happy
stretching and dancing around me
eyes bright with the familiar question
“Where are we going today?”.

Later
the walk home seemed longer
with your empty collar
heavy in my hand.

Molten yellow wax held me entranced
suspended within a glowing lamp
my little room, my comfortable gloom
walls papered with faces and thought
so safe, even in the aftermath
violation against volition
tearfully contrived contrition
memories wrapped in cotton mist
and the brittle fragility of my youthful simplicity
as I tapped out tales of stupendous stupidity.

Where my heroes would hold me close
roiling cramps from an incorrect dose
among tumbling words from the gods I heard
the deep resonance of the renaissance man
where I would lay for hours in silent howls
scissors bleeding and clarity receding
mosquitoes eager to commence their feasting
humming in my head told me and scolded me
“It’s not over and you’re not done yet,”
where the world came to a violent end
over and over and forever again
where the door bore scars from my impotent fist
where I cracked my toe in a raging fit
where tantrums broke when I awoke
while my nightmares lay down and slept.

Where a single song could contain me
when nothing else could save me
and for every moment that I spent
I could recall another unique torment
that Pandora’s box filled with dirty socks
where my life was as cheap as the rent.

She drew music in the sand with her toes
laughing as she tried to explain again
how the universe could be rearranged
while the key might not change at all
and the rise and fall of her merciful voice
guided my eyes along those rivulet lines
until the tide began to sluggishly turn
and the waves rose up to erase her work.

“It’s all just crows sitting on telephone wires!”
I said with half a heart and a stubborn head
“Scales and intervals and diminished chords
it’s a load of nonsense with a pleasant form.”

She laughed, smiling perhaps
for the last time in that decade’s span
we were ignorant and blissful for an afternoon
until the ferry returned to take us home.

A hunter moves in sudden bursts
furtive track across a vertical desert
minute black eyes and yellow scales
he is forever ready to drop his tail
lest another predator should appear
to turn the hunter into his meal.

While out in the garden a lazy buzz
as a fattened gatherer wanders about
bumbling drunk within a sugar rush
blue belly shining in the orange sun
a life of flight from orchid to rose
collecting flowers for the family home.

Ignoring both the gecko and the little bee
a noble thief scrambles among the leaves
for secrets to discover under netting cover
forbidden fruits are purloined with ease
“Hidden treasures are the greatest of pleasures!”
said the clever crow with his blueberry feast.

Heavy thoughts for this empty head
I always hoped we would meet again
but the moon hides her anguished eye
and the sun blushes bright in shame
as we steal a moment in despair’s embrace
while our pancake planet goes up in flames.

Behold! My lump of holy midnight gold
my compressed pet
my best damn friend
pulled from the banks of a stagnant creek
my pound of fossil flesh
my chunk of destiny manifest.

Merry Christmas! from the sacred coalface
now an endless Summer with no solace
Season’s Greetings! said the koalas weeping
we can’t stand the heat ’cause the kitchen’s burning
Wishing You All the Best! from the edges of the earth
we’re just cooking up the end of the bloody world.

“If you only climb a mountain once a year
you can’t really call yourself a mountaineer…”

Deleting myself
gives me a sense of what control must be like
a taste of power with sweet and sour
while hanging on for happy hour.

Noodle arms and stir-fried brain
this place doesn’t feel the same
I’m always too cooked or under-done
embittered by what I’ve not become
how am I supposed to find composure
in the tedium of raw sobriety?

Smoke and mirrors
whats for dinner?
I would eat my own head
if it allowed me to forget
that I am the culmination
of those hapless generations
lost to time and creeping death
I am where the story ends.

Where the estuary opened her arms wide
enticing embrace from the vaulted sky
in the shade of tangled mangrove boughs
we lightly explored the depths of love
with salt and vinegar for reckless beginners
a taste of elation with a lemon slice
seagulls descended to eat our lunch
and it never mattered in the slightest
that the evening tides were against us
sands receding with the sun’s retreating
we fumbled, unsure and stubbornly insecure
our hands weaving an impossible knot
our hearts were bound and beat as one.

I am the painter
pigments primed
suffused and saturated
splitting white light
my cup may run over
but a true creator
is never satiated.

I have constructed
a vast and arid canvas
I have conceived
a horizon without blemish
I have contrived
this choking ochre dust
this unnatural orange rust
this thickening
this quickening
this poison in your blood
I have composed
a future for a faceless multitude
I have cursed
you, your children
and your children’s own.

I was birthed in obscurity
smothered in secrecy
and now
I am murder in perpetuity.

I am the rainbow
refracted and remorselessly perfected
no frail human hand
may grasp my venomous essence
as I pour from the thunderous heavens.

 

Note – today I did some reading about the Vietnam War, and learnt that Orange wasn’t the only colour we painted the landscape. We also used Agents Blue, White, Green, Pink and Purple. No care for the people we dropped it on, whether they were on the other ‘side’ or ours, nor the generations who came after. Who knew that war-crime was so bloody colourful?

Awake too late
in reverie inanimate
yet conscious and constrained
besieged with vagary
bound within myself
turning over
and over again
wrapping my perceptions
a dull reverberation
dawn breaks
as I fall out of bed.

Mowing the lawn?
You’re doing it
wrong
but I care just enough
to provide for you son
my life’s
only lesson.

Don’t break your back
staggering around your stack
with a thrashing howling living machine
rock shard and cut grass spraying
sweat cooking on your back…
No! you take that mower
and you rip it apart
scatter its guts all over the yard
let the blades rust in the Summer sun
then you go buy another one
and repeat this every weekend
until every inch of earth on your land
is home to some ruined piece of machinery
and the lawn will be
the least of your worries.

Take it from me, I’m a puzzling man
that is,
I’ve framed all the jigsaws I’ve ever done
and when I’m gone that’s all I’ll leave behind
puzzles and garbage
pornography and dreams
and my shack with views of the ocean deep.

 

Author’s note – Long story short, I went a bit crazy the last few weeks and nearly bought an alleged ‘house’ (in reality a run down rubbish-strewn shack in the middle of nowhere about four hours away from where I, or anyone else lives). In between dealing with all the loan sharks and real estate double agents, I spent a long time inspecting the place with the caretaker. It was a deceased estate, and the family hadn’t made even the barest effort to clean. And as I stood there in among the busted asbestos panels, tangled fishing rods, faded filth magazines, and all the accumulated detritus of another human’s life, I had a bit of a moment…

All lined up in my sights
my little duckies in a row
a dozen windows open all at once
and then at last I’m home
fading red wine melancholy
paired with your sacred text
my evening hums with electricity
as I bathe in your eccentricities
discovering and recovering
aspects long lost, now resurfacing
or carefully concealed, re-emerging
fragments I once discarded
re-birthed in wanton laughter
your songs are a lullaby to my soul.

Greedy as a starving dog
I consume your musical words
graceless in my unrestrained gluttony
your glorious expression surpassing me
your clever deceptions delighting me
you lead me along the garden path
you get me higher than heaven itself
and for all the hours I should have slept
I would make your poetry my gentle bed
comforting myself within your essence
your thoughts become my convalescence
and with your loving holy hands
and your blessed, messy, crazy heads
you wrote me out of hell.

Most people wouldn’t sleep
with a weapon in their bed
but you never met
my axe girlfriend.

Fumbling picking with prickly fingers
chords that jangle when they should chime
callous growth and my forlorn hopes
I’ll make these cliches dance in time
a worn-out phrase born from naivete
climbing chaos like a jungle-gym
can’t persuade myself to save myself
wandering hands play a lonely hymn
reveal yourself to me
with your melodic screed
crows strung along a telephone wire
reaching heights I couldn’t aspire
summoning crumbs
twiddling thumbs
someone’s gotta feed these chickens.

Out of the frying pan
and into the bottle
staying cooked
is a constant battle
bless my stars bless my claws
overlook all my obvious flaws
this boiled meat
tastes so sweet
be safe, my dearest of friends
and have a crabby Halloween!

In Western Sydney the girls are pretty
and the boys are prettier still
working past dark in Hurlstone Park
“Gotta pay those fucking bills.”

Hit the frog and toad with long-neck to go
all slings and round-a-bouts
sun’s out guns out for the ‘roid rage knaves
“I reckon it’s about your shout”

Blacktown, Shalvey, Bankstown and Canterbury
tribal divides run deep
lock your windows or they’ll steal your dreams
and pull burnouts on heat-sink streets.

Others long gone like a forgotten song
snake skeletons beside a creek
now the low overhead wires crackle with ire
and all bastards become police.

Mcmansions rise over the old sand mines
tasteless solid investments
while red brick boxes built on buried toxins
pull curtains on congealing terrors.

Newtown’s terraces with the screaming jets
sipping on neck-beard tea
a backyard fracas breaks an afternoon balm
“Just pay your fucking tick!”

In the Picton tunnels the underground runners
tag walls with obscure glyphs
when the last train has gone have one more bong
“You smoke green or do you spin?”

Palms and cactus sprouting phallic masses
wine box dining or uber eats
the kebab shop’s hot with a variety box
no greens but plenty of meat.

Dulwich Hill how I remember you still
packed with hungry artists
but do me a favour and what’s your flavour
why water a concrete garden?

The Silk Road flows through Marrickville’s rows
scene kids never beheld the sea
strung out and strung up but heaven will come
with adrenaline and methylated spirits.

I climbed Mount Druitt! (someone’s gotta do it)
I swam in Liverpool’s depths
I digested myself and I divested myself
my steps bounced like bad cheques.

My lads and lasses in those discrete madrasahs
from Burwood to the Iron Cove Bridge
I’ll pretend that I know all your hidden codes
your mangled secretive language.

Tin shed alleys behind crumbling garrets
music thumping all night
but for the Wicked Witch of the Inner West
the mosquitoes refuse to bite.

I know it’s a shit-hole but save your vitriol
for cleaning the mouldy tiles
just forget your castle and white picket fence
and embrace our bogan vibe.

 

Author’s note – I know this one won’t make a lot of sense to some of my international friends, so if you want translations or explanations of any of the Aussie bullshit let me know in the comments.

Tension and torsion
in awkward contortion
shouldering your boulders
with feedback distortion
tepid trickling
insipid liquidity
crackling knuckles
concealed and dormant
with a phrase of praise for heroes fallen
letters on graves of door-knock salesmen
wound up round up
kick them all over
revel in your relevance
and fade in frustration
summon your sprites in a fit of pique
assembled solicitors paid for in spite
spectral spectators
in abandoned forums
cheering like starlings
chattering and swarming
snapping out lashing out
lacking decorum
anger feeds hatred
while hate eats itself
and don’t ever say
that I didn’t warn you.

Smoke and mirrors
a frozen dinner
ensnared reflection within the window
I am a golem
tasting the truth
or maybe just possums living in my roof.

Movement so furtive
no leaf disturbed
sky illuminated by simmering burn
dens in the heath
concealed in ferns
back striped with shadowy fur.

Their faces obscured by history
and their bones dispersed by flood
they stalk my sleep
depriving my dreams
howling in the hills a forgotten reprieve
where ghosts traverse unknown roads
painted tiger-dogs shyly roam
with babies locked in airtight jars
but for the necromancy of our art
those sad decrepit relicts
they sung to the last.

Plans had changed
we arrived late
those grand schemes
oh my splitting seams
“We lay the floor today
and raise the roof tonight!”

So with the confidence of our inexperience
we attacked the timber with blunt implements
like a parliament of plastered bastards
we argued with ourselves and cursed
the fools who built these uneven walls
until the afternoon had washed away
and saddle worn from straddling the sawhorse
with hands raw from scraping the lathe
these city boys in this carpenter’s war
we declared a truce and I succumbed
to heady dehydration and intoxication.

Half drunk in a hydroponic haze
surrounded by a cloud of digital mist
my boots clattered on wooden stairs
and instinct guided my stumbling gait
toward the stone cut seawall
to stand against the Easterly flurry
and precariously ponder
and consider the options
to accept my execrable prognosis
or embrace my belated apotheosis
to suffer rebirth through trial and test
with a can of worms for the birthday girl
and another bottle of your best.

“Come in, come back in
and bring the ocean with you!”

I shed my face and turned my head
as balance dragged me over the edge
flailing, infinite
and entirely indifferent
for a second or maybe two
until the mud rose up to meet me
crowning me in bedraggled seaweed
slashing me with gnashing oyster teeth
and as I lay in on that damp sandy stretch
my waterlogged monologue concluded:

“Life’s a beach.”