C-sharp minor
plays through the eaves
of this house,
wind-cold emptiness, the ambient noise
of destruction
where laughter once lived,
Shoji, last opened to plum-blossom whispers,
now lachrymose with silent
half-life,
a bird singing for
no-one
it’s lunching,
suited in boardroom sociopathy
By 3pm, its black sartorial
boredom hangs
in downtown coffee bars
The city, at 6, loosens silk ties, casts lustful
stares across crowded pubs
Its throaty, pashmina’d laughs drift
over footlights at 8,
Around 10, it’s sporting fusion-cuisined
energy and scent of MSG
Overtimed road-crew neon reflects
stumbling stillettoes,
come midnight
And at 2am, it’s pyjama-shuffling
its drug-coma’d streets,
mad-haired, in the darkness
But you’ll find it
just before sunup,
reposed against periwinkle sky,
at its naked
best
The task was set by The only Cin,
Pesto Princess put up the prize,
Side View decided who should win –
That was me, to my surprise!
He looks out at the sparkling sea
and drinks his morning cup of tea
But there’s a shadow to his left,
the darkness of a soul distressed
He knows now he must move with haste
to stop a life from going to waste
“This time, this one, perhaps,” he thinks,
“maybe, I ‘ll pull back from the brink”
The Angel of The Gap, at dawn,
heads out once more across his lawn
to offer balm, a light to see
a way out from their misery,
to coax them not to end it all
and save them from that fatal fall.
Deep within caliginous soul,
I lost it, broken-hearted,
braced against the winter’s chill
of life’s great joys departed
And long remained it out of sight,
I could almost it forget,
but for dreamscapes late at night,
its engrams in my head
But journeys lit that which I lost,
dispersed its shrouding mists
If I were to believe in ghosts,
I’d see your hand in this
Who gives a rat’s?!
“I’m desperate to get on the field”, says Benjii Marshall.
Oh, who cares?
“Hawkins hot engagement…”
Blah, blah fishpaste
“Triple M woos Matthew Johns”
Ho hum
“Brendan Fevola…..”
Yaaaawn
“O’Farrell promises to dump home buyer’s tax”
Zzzzzzzz
“The main island of Japan moved 2.4 meters in yesterday’s quake”
?? !
“Quake shifted earth on its axis by 10cm”
WHAT?!
On the 600km journey –
she looks at flowers and clouds,
he computes mileage per litre,
she ponders the secrets of cows,
he remarks that it might storm later…
She sees the wire-pig mailbox,
he spies a snake on the road,
he surveys flood-plain paddocks,
she wonders if cows talk in code…
He thinks perhaps ‘Box of Frogs’,
she’d prefer peace for a while,
both laugh at the travelling dogs,
their windblown ears and their smiles.
This perfection:
deep indigo of the blueberry,
saturated primaries of the King Parrot,
ochres painted by the setting sun,
is exquisite pain; I want its DNA,
to become the silence of the desert night,
whisper of quarks in the inky blackness,
nocturnal song of the African bush,
to inhale sensation of crushed silk,
embody cool water on skin,
synthesize oblivion of deep sleep.
But these are lambent shadows,
intangible ticklings
of some ancient sense –
when observed, they are gone.
She wanders not lonely as a cloud
but angry as a dust devil,
with judgement cloaked in blaming shroud
slowburn of anger, febrile.
What fate befell that sweet, sharp mind
now plagued with thoughts of violence
to spawn sensibilities so unsound
and increasingly mere silence?
What confounding ills did rear
this sullen, raging presence?
A once bright light, no longer here,
her love, an evanescence.
Storm ions mass,
stir up old injuries,
swelling cats’ paws,
silencing cockatoos mid-screech.
In the particle zoo,
darker the light
settles stillness unsettling
like a spine tingle…
Then
an electric spear is thrown,
punctures the tension.
Fat clouds, slow on the uptake,
grumble to rain
to wash it away.
posing as a bestie, but beware
for it is said
this creature is a beastie
Rent-a-husband is her game
and yours is in her sights
when darkness falls, she’ll come for him
so don’t go working nights
“Can you help me with my …”
(stick WHATEVER in the blank)
ain’t his boy scout skills she wants
Girlfriends, let’s be frank
With all-consuming envy
she’s competing for your life
she wants your house, the car you drive,
to replace you as his wife
So, good women everywhere,
keep friends you know are true
but guard against the frenemy
lest her prey is you
Reduce waste, improve service levels
I’m sailing down the Mekong
implement LEAN techniques
lilt of Mandarin in my ears
reduce bottlenecks, manage cash flows
building schools in Vietnam
forecast seasonality peaks
to the sound of children’s cheers
filming critters in the Galapagos
giant tortoise and marine iguana
orangutans in Borneo
and Amazonian flora and fauna
dining in the Shanghai Bund
cycling through rural China
catching Tokyo no kabuki-za
and jazz in a New York diner
capturing Northern winter snows
ancient men in Parisian alleys
icebergs in Antarctica
vineyards in Chilean valleys
Optimize
camping out on English moors
Streamline
for some creative brooding
Synchronize
writing that novel in my head
but right now work’s intruding!
You must be logged in to post a comment.