Monday, September 1, 2014

The Writer's Blog Tour


The writing life: artist's impression
I’ve been tagged in the Writer’s Blog Tour by Tim Sterne, author of many fine blogs, articles, reviews and my heart. Also a very tall man.

What am I working on?

I’m not working on anything specific at the moment, in terms of ‘a project’. I still write my book reviews to deadline (good girl, ARPy), and sometimes I write a poem or two. I’m always in the cycle of sending stuff out to journals, receiving the responses and sending stuff out again (I’ve always been a bit of a submission-junkie). Sometimes I go through all of the poems that are “in circulation”, edit the crap out of them, tear some to shreds, ditch some altogether. Being vicious is kinda fun.

How does my work differ from others in my genre?

Reviewing: I guess as I only review children’s and YA books, it means my criticism falls into a fairly narrow genre. I feel like it’s the only genre I can bring enough back-reading and critical confidence to, without feeling like I’m talking out of my arse. I like to feel like I know what I’m doing. So does my arse.

Poetry: This is a question doesn’t really apply neatly to ‘poetry’ as a genre, but I’ll have a crack at teasing out some common threads I notice in my own work (in the Cliffs Notes, this will fall under Themes and Motifs). I mostly write poems that are ‘stories’, I like a narrative. I rarely write imagistic poetry and even less experimental/abstract poetry. A few non-writer friends have told me “I don’t like poetry, but I like yours”, which probably means they’ve just had the wrong poetry inflicted on them, but I think if I’m telling a story, everyone can access that, and not have to worry they’re not picking up on Homeric references.* I like to write with restrictions on both time, form and content, as in the years I have done Month of Poetry – if I have to work 12 phrases suggested by 12 different people into one poem overnight, it makes me feel a bit like a magician (I am also a show-off.) I’m interested in how the Big Things like birth and death are intricately bound up with the mundane, domestic and trivial. The slow death of a loved one is tied to the sense memory of uncomfortable cups of hospital tea. I’m fascinated by how we struggle to create meaning out of a kind of sensory Gestalt – the interconnections of perception and memory. None of this is ‘different’ to other poetry in any unique way; it’s just where my interests lie. I also like to make jokes about cocks.

Fiction: It happens rarely, though I know I should make more time to try to write it. When I do write stories, I often write about children (though not really for them), especially children in the twilight of childhood, not quite teenagers, but just old enough to begin to notice things about adults, the things they say, the things that don’t quite add up. I can remember eavesdropping on my mum and her friends talking when I was about 11, and realising they were talking about how one of their husbands was having an affair. There’s a strange door of awareness starting to open at that age, and it feels really weird.

Why do I write what I do?

Reviews: I’ll be honest: I write them mostly for the money these days. Writing commissioned reviews is hard because you rarely get sent the books you’d really like to review (both on the positive and negative side), and I’ve been burnt by reputable journals treating their reviewers like crap (not publishing, not paying, not answering emails, dragging this out for over a year. Really poor form. You know who you are.)

Poetry: I can actually answer this one properly. Poetry is the only creative endeavour I’ve attempted where I’ve felt that the end product actually mirrors what I wanted to create. I find the process of writing uncomfortable and messy and it makes me feel fucking stupid, but in the end I can often look at my poems and think “Yes, that’s what I meant”, even if I can’t say why or how it works.

Fiction: Up front: I haven’t written a short story since 2010, and before that I hadn’t written one since 2008. Perhaps I should come back to this one when I’ve made a bit more effort?

How does my writing process work?

Reviewing: I read the book (usually advisable), fold down a bunch of corners, bitch/gush to Tim about it for like a really long time, then finally sit down and write the review in one go. Quick edit the next day, send it off. Brutal.

Poetry/fiction: I used to joke that I’d write a “brilliant” last line of a poem first, then write the rest of the poem, then cross out that last line. It’s not exactly true, but often the word or line that inspires a poem will be cut out by the time I’m finished. My writing process for poetry and fiction doesn’t work in any structured way in that I don’t have time allotted to writing. I’ll write at various times of day or night, when I’m sick, when I’m drunk, when I’m at work, when I want to (fun!), when I don’t want to (less fun). I take notes of ideas and lines of poetry in far too many different places and eventually drag them together. If I want to write a poem but I can’t think of anything to write about, I steal a phrase from a random book off our shelves, and go from there. I also don’t like to leave things incomplete – I resent any unfinished poems or short stories languishing on my computer, and try to make sure I go back to them. Those words are there to be submitted, and they gotta earn their keep.

When I decide a poem or story is too old/not as good as I thought it was, I cannibalise it for lines and phrases to recycle in another piece. Sometimes I rewrite a poem into a story, and vice versa. I write by hand, on computer, and on my phone. Once I’ve finished writing a poem or story, I give it a rest, an edit and then I send it somewhere. I like my writing to be ‘out to work’ as soon as possible (hence my submission junkie status). When something is rejected, by the time I send it somewhere else it’s usually had another edit. And another, and another. This constant editing has resulted in me not always recognising my poem or story if it’s published, as the first draft is the one that tends to stick in my mind. When I read the printed version (sometimes edited and rewritten over 10+ years), my first reaction is usually “Hey! This is much better than the one I remember!”

In general:

Over the years I’ve gotten more comfortable with the fact that sometimes I am writing, sometimes I am not. It used to scare me, like if I stopped I would never start again. But I’ve gradually become more chilled about the idea of peaks and troughs in my output. Because there’s always other stuff to be doing, and if I’m not writing ‘for publication’, I’m still always keeping my diary and corresponding with my 20 snail mail penpals. I work a full time job, and I have a wonderful boyfriend and children who I want to spend my best hours with. Writing for me is something I stuff into the little gaps, something I do around the edges, and I think that for me, that’s just about perfect.

Tag time:

Sean Elliott: Writer, very tall man, explainer of science in amusing and inventive ways.

David Witteveen: Writer, very tall man, tactfully fixes problems with the library computers when it turns out I just haven’t noticed the plug has fallen out.

Alice Cannon: Writer, not a very tall man, publisher of the fantastic journals Materiality and Crank (the former whose Pozible you should totally throw money at).



* There aren’t any.

Sunday, August 17, 2014

Recently I did...

At the request of two people (overkill really, one is all I need), here a round up of my last few publications (excluding reviews, as I put them on Goodreads after a bit anyway).

Most recently, my poem 'Evicted' appeared in Epigraph Magazine, a US online poetry magazine you can read for free!

My short story 'Human Surface' appeared in Atticus Review, another US online journal you can read to your hip pocket's content. I love Atticus, I'd recommend reading it even when I'm not in it.

My short story 'Only After School' appeared in issue 6 of Tincture Journal, an Australian epub journal (issue 6 is currently on special for $5, so get to it). I know - what's with having short stories published? I don't write many, so I'm as surprised as you are.

My poem 'Footprints' appeared in The Gap-Toothed Madness, a US print magazine with an excellent title.




My poems 'Tropical Fruit' and 'Soothe the Savage' appeared in foam:e, an Australian online poetry journal that's free to read.

My short story 'Delivery Day' appeared in Materiality: Precious, an excellent themed Australian journal piloted by the lovely Alice Cannon. Incidently, the next issue of Materiality (which I'll also be in) has a Pozible running, so fling it some money if you can!

My love poem 'Enough' appeared in the Poetry D'Amour 2014 anthology - it sold out but I finally got my hands on copy, so those of you who asked to read my poem now can. Guess who I wrote it for.




My poem 'Treasure Maps' appeared in the Australian print journal Westerly. They still pay by cheque, which I think is the way it always should be. Cheques are so nice and tangible!

My poem 'Newborn' appeared in Tincture Journal issue 4, which is also only $5 to buy now.

And my poem 'A good nose for a road trip' appeared in The Age, which is always a thrill because I can say 'The Age' to old relatives and they know what I'm talking about.




Thursday, August 14, 2014

Four-Sentence MIFF Reviews #5-8: I Hired a Contract Killer, Clara and the Secret of the Bears, Jack, Patema Inverted

I Hired a Contract Killer (Aki Kaurismaki)

Henri shuffles between his dingy apartment and his equally dingy job pushing paper from one side of a desk to another. When he loses his position at work, he tries to commit suicide, but can't quite get the job done, so he hires a contract killer to take himself out. This is a nicely odd film which manages to make something strangely lovable out of a series of deadpan encounters between unlikely people. It's the film version of a really dry, really crumpled, really black t-shirt that actually looks quite good once you put it on.



Clara and the Secret of the Bears (Tobias Ineichen)

13 year old Clara lives in the Swiss Alps with her mother and step-father, and is delighted one day to encounter a bear cub in the mountains. But as she is drawn into fraught disputes among townsfolk about the bears, Clara discovers her connection to a past wronging of nature, and to a ghost girl with unfinished business. The time-slip elements are perfectly handled, Clara's friendship with a new local boy is pleasingly unromantic, and the father-daughter elements are very touching. Twelve year old me would have killed to see this film, and thirty-three year old me loved it too.



Jack (Edward Berger)

When Jack's mum has him bundled off to a children's home for convenience, and dumps his younger brother with a friend "for the night", we work out that she pretty much sucks. But resourceful Jack believes against all evidence that his mum still wants them, so he takes off to find his younger brother and reunite the family. Wonderfully unsentimental, this is a film that never manipulates the audience or even demonises Jack's mother (though I would really like to punch her in the face). The moment at the end of the film where Jack ages emotionally a few years in a few seconds is a real credit to the film's subtlety.



Patema Inverted (Yasuhiro Yoshiura)

When a scientific experiment went wrong, half the population were suddenly inversely affected by gravity, sending scores of people and buildings 'falling up into the sky'. Those that survived retreated below the surface, walking on the underground ceilings of those left above. As soon as I saw the detailed animation of Patema's grimy, mechanical world, I was sold. Absorbing, beautifully animated, often incredibly tense and demanding full concentration - and featuring a male and female protagonist who were balanced in agency and importance.

Tuesday, August 5, 2014

Four-Sentence MIFF Reviews #3-4: Ping Pong Summer, The Galapagos Affair

Ping Pong Summer (Michael Tully)

Radford is on summer holiday and makes an instant best friend in Teddy (who is honestly what I imagine Luka will be like as 13 year old). There's girls, too much sugar, and naturally a pair of bullies who try to make Radford's life hell. The movie is saturated with 80s nostalgia and overacting in a way that the 80s never was (apart from possibly the overacting), but I happily accepted this movie as a feature-long cross between an episode of Round The Twist and Ship to Shore. Complete with gurning bullies and a freeze frame happy ending.


The Galapagos Affair (Dan Geller)

In 1929, somewhat berko doctor (and Nietzsche obsessive - always a bad sign) Friedrich Ritter and his devotee Dore Strauch embrace their shared misanthropy and move to the uninhabited Galapagos island of Floreana. It's gonna be great - then other people show up and things go bad and holy crap disappearances and possible murders and this shit is crazy. This documentary left me saying "wow, that was real?", and given how many fucked up documentaries I watch, that's saying something. The sheer weight of actual footage, documents from the islanders, and interviews with surviving family members are the only things that make this unbelievable story even faintly believable.

Friday, August 1, 2014

Four-Sentence MIFF Reviews #1-2: Life Itself, Irma Vep

Yes folks, it's that glorious time of year (otherwise known as about the only time I post on this blog any more), where I get to go to 13 films at the Melbourne Film Festival and post a review of each one in four sentences. You know what they say: "slightly longer than a tweet - it's the way of the future."



Life Itself (Steve James)

An intimate documentary following film critic Roger Ebert in his final months of life, stretching back to cover his life, career, family and contemporaries.
The impact of Ebert's film criticism cannot be overestimated, but in this funny and moving documentary I also learned more about the circle his life encompassed: his friends, family, colleagues, and his perfect fit for the time he was born in.
It's a deeply emotional portrait of a man facing death, which left me holding it together (for the most part) but still shaking with emotion.
And the answer to why on earth a man like Ebert decided to write Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and work with Russ Meyer: "Boobs".



Irma Vep (Olivier Assayas)

Maggie Cheung is flown to Paris to work with an unstable avant garde film director; nobody is entirely sure why.
There's interest and amusement in the chaotic scenes of film-making, but I found my attention drifting in and out over the course of the film, and overall it doesn't quite seem to make full use of the story it's trying to tell.
Also: if you're going to cat-burgle someone, a latex catsuit is the noisiest possible outfit you could choose to wear.
On the upside: Maggie Cheung in a latex catsuit.

Thursday, April 24, 2014

The letters I'd love to write - letters to asylum seekers

The recent GetUp! letter-writing campaign to let asylum seekers know that we care, and that we disagree with how they are being treated, caught my eye. Not just as a regular letter-writer, but as a human being.

I eagerly read the instructions for the campaign, and was discouraged when I realised I couldn't take part.

Letter-writing for a purpose: you're doing it wrong. It starts well:

1. You're asked to write a letter to a non-specific asylum seeker: obviously fine.
2. You're asked to say who you are and make it personal, so the recipient knows that you're not acting on behalf of the government: also fine.
3. You're asked to include a self-addressed envelope so the unknown person you write to can see exactly where you live: this is not fine. If the person you are writing to is randomly assigned, wherever they are in the world and regardless of their status, this is problematic.
4. There are no details provided as to whether your name, address, details of your letter, details of who receives your letter, whether they respond to your letter, etc, are recorded by Julian Burnside, any government agency, or the companies running camps on Manus Island or Nauru. This is problematic.

As a long-time letter-writer to both private penpals and charity letter-writing programs, I'm both sad and annoyed I can't take part in something that could be much better organised with a bit more effort.

This is why, for example, child sponsorship charities have a very careful system of letter-writing - you write to a general office, and your letter goes through this 3rd party which strips the letter of your address on the way. It's not a particularly difficult system - and if, as with charity systems, it would cost me the price of an overseas stamp then I would take up my papers and write and write and write to asylum seekers who I wish could be treated better, and tell them how it fills me with disgust that they are treated in such a revolting way in our country's name.

But with this program, to say it again - you're doing it wrong.

Letter-writing charities have been doing it right for decades - if you can do it right too, I'm happy to pay double for the stamps. Sign me up.

Monday, February 17, 2014

Popularity contest

And the most liked poems from Month of Poetry were:

First days
Pit stop
Australia Day
Powerful element
Best spot near the box
Breadline
Winter

So if you couldn't be bothered reading all thirty poems, there's a shortlist instead!

Saturday, February 1, 2014

Month of Poetry 2014 - vote for your favourite

Thank you all for reading and contributing to this year's Month of Poetry for me!

By popular request (of at least 2 people), please vote for your favourite Month of Poetry 2014 poem. I'll publish the results in about a week, yeah? (If you need to remember which poem is which, just click on the January part of the Blog Archive in the sidebar, and in theory all the links should be there.)

Thanks for playing :)



Your favourite Month of Poetry 2014 poem?
#1: How many
#2: Twelve
#3 Hog Calling
#4: Breadline
#5: Commercial service - 3 out of 5 stars
#6: Winter
#7: Ultimate floor
#8: Too close to home
#9: Shopping centre
#10: Red
#11: A natural death
#12: An attitude of existence
#13: Captain January
#14: At the museum
#15: Words on a hot night
#16: Hidden folk
#17: May as well be sisters
#18: Best spot near the box
#19: Rolling gallstones
#20: The first time
#21: Upside down
#22: Late for work
#23: Powerful element
#24: Party poem
#25: Australia Day
#26: Pit stop
#27: Melted
#28: First days
#29: From bed to anywhere
#30: The study isn't published
Poll Maker

Friday, January 31, 2014

Month of Poetry #30: The study isn't published

We could speak of it as inspiration or discipline,
map the process of falling in love as if an awareness
of the structure working behind it deepens one's
pleasure and absorption. We could compare ourselves
to plants, seeds heaven sent and homegrown.
But I don't want to talk botanically about it.

There's always a way to be scientific about
emotions. Cow hormones have the young
people all fucked up with lust, bovine eyelashes
fluttering with whatever burger they had last night.
I do what I do not because of steroids, but I do
because somehow I like the pain, the heady fumes.

Madness to compare the frightfully delicious
deliriums of how rapture repeats itself, first time
as a kind of mania, later an unknown
compelling force where nothing rips your skin
apart like a formal airport farewell. My lovely
hand on yours, guillotine departure gates.

Academia hasn't graphed the cliche level of
saying we laughed til we died, of feeling something
changed, of first I love you. The study isn't
published yet on the slow ride to comfort
where we laugh at farts and you let me pee
with the door open so I could watch Grey's Anatomy.

We could assert commonalities, piss off new
couples with references to The Honeymoon Period.
We were all undergraduates once, but terms of
analysis shift and raise eyebrows at old essays.
Once frantic arms, relaxed with everyday
reassurance that we are here, we have all the time.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@josie_is: frightfully delicious
@ernmalleyscat: but I do because somehow I like the pain (TISM, Mystery of the artist explained)
@sleepingdingo: farewell my lovely
@spikelynch: inspiration or discipline (year 11 extension english assignment)
@attentive: repeats itself, first time as (attr. Marx)
@matchtrick: an unknown compelling force (official cause of death given by Soviet investigators into the Dyatlov Pass incident)
@urbabe: but I don't want to talk botanically
@JayJayCee1: and we laughed til we died
@timsterne: cow hormones have the young people all fucked up (Donald Ray Pollock, Knockemstiff)
@MissButtons_: heaven sent and homegrown
@GretaPunch: you let me pee with the door open so I could watch Grey's Anatomy
@ReadingSheilas: an awareness of the structure working behind it deepens one's pleasure and absorption (Julian Novitz on The Luminaries)



Thursday, January 30, 2014

Month of poetry #29: From bed to anywhere

It often felt a long way from bed to anywhere.
Closer each day to leaving blinds shut,
letting sheets weigh everything down like
they're never gonna give. You, up and about
on a mission: killing baby cockroaches in
the bathroom, scrubbing at corner grime
until you gained thin ropes of muscles between
your thumb and forefinger. There was no item
you could not fetch. My octopus partner, blurred
hands tidying in circles around the static bed.

When I first got stuck everyone took drama for a bludge,
advised snapping out the happy, preached that
to recover one has to be mindful.
Of the structural features: I had all the work sheets,
can rattle off CBT like a third year psych class.
That Aaron Beck, apparently he's a kind of saviour
for times of intellectual distress, though he's led
to a lot of useless photocopying.

Late afternoon in a parade of what I used to do,
a palimpsest of forgotten enthusiasms,
shredded layers of posters advertising joys
that quietly erased themselves.
When it came to a choice between phone box
or shower I glazed with endless scrolling,
dampening the lack of movement.
There'll be no sudden Pixar moment,
I'm just a squirrel trying to get a nut-case
mindset in my grasp and kick it off
like a doona on a hot night.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@sleepingdingo: killing baby cockroaches in the bathroom
@chantarelle: closer each day (Home and Away Theme Song)
@pinknantucket: I'm just a squirrel trying to get a nut (Boyd Crowder)
@matchtrick: fetch my octopus
@spikelynch: everyone took drama for a bludge (year 11 on the first day)
@JayJayCee1: gained thin ropes of muscles (Lisa Gardner, Say Goodbye)
@ernmalleyscat: never gonna give you up
@attentive: one has to be mindful of the structural features (opinion piece, The Australian)
@ReadingSheilas: he's a kind of saviour for times of great intellectual distress (Bourdieu on Wittgenstein)
@timsterne: a palimpsest of forgotten enthusiasms (Boyd Oxlade, Death in Brunswick)
@MissButtons_: phone box or shower

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Month of Poetry #28: First days

Asphalt and tan bark, small hot hands.
Big hats and shorts at ankle length:
no way a kneecapping could work
scabs onto those invisible knees.
Neither one of us knows which track
to follow to the classroom. This line,
left blank intentionally with room for
small feet to shuffle into rows and
wait for the ball. This metal equipment
a new contraption. To capture a dandelion
in one piece is the work of lunchtime
lotus-sitters picking at the hot grass.
In a rush of blue and yellow you are tiny,
teeth bared for new brave meat.
I wave and there's no crying,
in baseball there's no crying,
in cornball there's my wet face drying
slowly in five years of sunlight.

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@chantarelle: there's no crying in baseball
@jellyjellyfish: there's no crying in cornball
@ernmalleyscat: this line left blank intentionally
@JayJayCee1: neither one of us knows (The Marvellous Toy)
@timsterne: a new contraption to capture a dandelion in one piece (Boards of Canada, 'Dandelion')
@GretaPunch: a kneecapping could work





Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Month of Poetry #27: Melted

Hot nights, dreams of streets
I can cross, fighting.
A demon: off my bucket list
and onto the immediate to-do.
It's not that hot, but the mannequins
disguised as pancake makeup
are melting into life. They shudder
across town, stumble into each other
like they're having sex.
To the kids in America they send
punches, neck snaps, and a feeling
of benevolent distance not unlike
the second baby effect.
One man, pupils swollen and jagged
he reached for his pocket, and found
there only reality of handgun.
Half-slop monsters adore the bullets
each trigger finger that cries
Fuck the Jellys! and fires hard
will find the blob rolls on.
The universe is expanding in
a tide of molten plastic, here
and there a hand, a foot, a shoulder,
a remarkable likeness of Steve McQueen.

---------------------------------------------------------
Including suggestions from:

@JayJayCee1: the universe is expanding
@ernmalleyscat: He reached for his pocket, and found there, only reality (Victor Hugo, The Hunchback of Notre Dame)
@eglantinescake: second baby effect
@pinknantucket: I can cross fighting a demon off my bucket list (Sleepy Hollow)
@matchtrick: mannequins disguised as pancake (The Boy)
@timsterne: They're having sex to 'The Kids in America' (Luke Haines, Discomania)
@facelikethunder: it's not that hot
@jellyjellyfish: fuck the Jellys! (unintentional contribution)





Monday, January 27, 2014

Month of poetry #26: Pit stop

The town I reach when still I've got kilometres to go.
Behind me, discontent with nappy: my grumpy elf.
Gaze in action for a public inconvenience, in petrol terms
I drove four cars into the ocean road, back to main street.
The toddler mauls his lollipop, blue smears across his face
and mischief in his eyes. Sticky smurf, emitting blue fumes.
I focus, narrow the lens: local pub. Looks like a large amount
of not something, but much better than the scent in the car.
How would you like your hobbit-child smelling like the
back end of Hobbiton? We pass under the faded VB banner.
Leather robots with soul omissions look us up, down.
Dot-point our misplacements in a list. Comprehensions find
mother and toddler, where more often enters a crumpled
bag of skin and a diet of kangaroo's testicles.
Was all too much for them: woman and baby in here,
asking for the toilet, hefting bags of life in from outside.
Eyes-down barman points quickly down a hall, we sidle
out of sight before I see dust fall in chunks from their mouths.

-------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@realnixwilliams: not something, but much
@urbabe: elf gaze in action
@JayJayCee1: robots with soul (TED talk)
@sleepingdingo: I've got kilometres to go
@timsterne: a diet of kangaroo's testicles was all too much (Kenneth Cook, Wake in Fright)
@ernamalleyscat: drove four cars into the ocean (Ozzy Osbourne in AC/DC Maximum Rock n Roll)
@chantarelle: blue smears across his face and mischief in his eyes
@spikelynch: list comprehensions
@GretaPunch: how would you like your hobbit?

Sunday, January 26, 2014

Month of Poetry #25: Australia Day

There's been less of her beauty,
and her terror makes us disown.

Each speaker with granite eyes;
regarding his stone likeness
with blood still coursing our flesh.
One short, one fat, one lean, repeat
each in a cycle of removal and denial,
where the song ends:
all of them equally mean.

It falls into where I can't
think about for many minutes,
along with suicide, bruised babies
and freak accidents of unluck.

Those born a few thousand
plus a hundred and thirty-two clicks
away also have memories
level with the scent of the vinyl
bench seats in Dad's Kingswood.
In summer my children run toward waves,
no fear of her jewelled sea.

Breaking news, broken histories
give me angry stinging onion eyes.
Give us a hand to celebrate
and raise the middle finger high.

---------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@ReadingSheilas: her beauty and her terror (My Country, Dorothea MacKellar)
@urbabe: one short, one fat, one lean (Fantastic Mr Fox)
@home_sewn: stinging onion eyes
@ernmalleyscat: a hundred and thirty-two clicks (cricket commetary)
@JayJayCee1: regarding his stone likeness (Frank R Stockton, The Griffin and the Minor Canyon)
@xutraa: the vinyl bench seats in Dad's Kingswood
@timsterne: give us a hand to celebrate

Saturday, January 25, 2014

Month of Poetry #24: Party Poem

Whole morning spent sluicing icing,
trying to form constants of colour
and surface, dividing M&Ms.
There were many oranges, too many
blues. Brain cells spent divining brown
icing from a rainbow of four inks when
I could have just used cocoa.

It doesn't matter what are the best
storage containers, all I've got is
a plate that cling wrap won't cling to.
Parkside: already heavy legs and eyelids
like the seafloor wants me for kelp.

In a whirl the tablecloth is abandoned.
Chips are shaken into ugly china bowls
wind lifts the red dust from BBQ shapes
I wish we had bought heavier snacks.
The whole world arrives as an army.

Keeping track of Ninja Turtles and who
detests who: This guy? THIS IS NOT
MY KINDA GUY! I really don't care,
try to keep all cards, unmadden
the birthday boy, proffer juice. Here in a box
is squeezed one thousand Californias.

Gonna kill you soon, temperate breeze
if you don't let my Redheads light.
We've waited five years for this candle
it's only half an hour till we can go home.

Sticky kisses, shouts to the Subaru:
See you tomorrow, have fun at your dad's
At home, I line up the presents on
your bedroom floor for your return.
The joy inside them coiled like springs.


----------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@ReadingSheilas: what are the best storage containers? (Ms Harris' Book of Green Household Management)
@sulphura: there were many oranges
@matchtrick: California's gonna kill you soon (Iron and Wine, The Desert Babbler)
@spikelynch: form constants
@timsterne: This guy, this is not my kinda guy! (Buddy Rich, The Bus Tapes)
@ernmalleyscat: the seafloor wants me
@gingerandhoney: in a whirl





Friday, January 24, 2014

Month of Poetry #23: Powerful element

Fevered with the scent, all of the naked boys
and girls plaited together, twined like cake
and jam in the most delicious Swiss roll
I will eat. A butterfly sandwich of eyelash
kisses, pheromone cream filling and the
powerful element which propels her towards
him towards him towards her. Not one will
mind the gap of age or sex, they are all undone:
unwashing their mouths with their legs. In full
sun how crispy her pubic hair looked,
how browned his darling arse. Three boys
in a pyramid, ecstatic, the big fella leaning on
it counterweight. Three girls braiding their
thighs like thick warm hair. Summer hugs
them all with pastry and bakes them blind.
If this is some dream recipe of youth,
turn up the thermostat I don't wanna grow up.

-------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@matchtrick: all of the naked boys (Iron & Wine - Caught in the Briars)
@jellyjellyfish: mind the gap
@MissButtons_: I will eat a butterfly sandwich (Beatrix Potter)
@JayJayCee1: the powerful element which propels her (Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Jules Verne)
@chantarelle: I don't wanna grow up
@ernmalleyscat: big fella leaning on it (tennis commentary)
@timsterne: how crispy her pubic hair looked (John Sandford, Wicked Prey)



Thursday, January 23, 2014

Month of poetry #22: Late for work

For her arrival home,  he Marvin Gayed up:
his own nephew's mixtape, finally useful.
For dinner they would be visiting the flesh,
eating pigs' trotters and scoring each marvel
at its big puce depths of tendoned meat.
Her face, young and old and none of the above
Freckle dusting and overalls like
a grownup Punky Brewster. Denim in a
crumpled heap in the corner, his hands
played over limbs like a hollow bamboo
orbiting an unknown object until she
arced like someone shot her.
Right in front of me, the smiling dead.
Suddenly birds and grey morning light:
a distance between what was and what is.
Clocks showed a time he could not tell.
My wife, I'm going to be late for work.
Her electric fingers pushed back the minute hand.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Including suggestions from:

@matchtrick: what is clocks?
@JayJayCee1: like a hollow bamboo (song, Bodhi Khalid)
@home_sewn: electric fingers
@spikelynch: orbiting an unknown object (from Wikipedia description of the eclipsing binary star Îµ Aurigae)
@ReadingSheilas: someone shot her, right in front of me (Orphan Black)
@timsterne: He Marvin Gayed his own nephew (Vito Spatafore, The Sopranos)
@lalscotton: visiting the flesh eating pigs
@ernmalleyscat: marvel at its big puce depths (Vogon Poetry Generator on BBC site)
@attentive: tell my wife I'm going to be late (Peter Ludwigsen, A Hijacking)
@GretaPunch: none of the above
@slimejam: Punky Brewster

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Month of poetry #21: Upside down

Something popped the
train smack off the rails
maybe an oral fixation
maybe dental fixative.
Domesticated and aged
in the wrong sort of oak.

Not gradual, nothing like
my finger went astray in
a quickly typed password.
Someone changed the
whole keyboard to Greek
and it all Greek was to us.

Put a key in his life, turned it
upside down. Strange mouth
to my sister: you lost a man,
now songs are boring.
To my brother: yo homes,
smell ya later! Then tears.

Paced in anaemic tiger tread
from lounge to bathroom
caged and bloodless.
Gumming one thumb
kept warm by the ancient
jungle memories of summer.

--------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@chantarelle: maybe an oral fixation (Chris Pine)
@JayJayCee1: My finger went astray (The Giant, O'Brien, Hilary Mantel)
@timsterne: Yo Homes, smell ya later (The Fresh Prince of Bel Air)

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Month of poetry #20: The first time

The first time isn't about wanting
one or the other. My worry is
heartbeats and brains. Never I'll hear
a whisper in my head saying I hope you're
not a girl, not a boy, not a pair.
I just hope you're there.

The first time isn't like seeing life.
Throbbing in bulges of shadow
if I could I wouldn't touch you.
With a plastic one-handled scanner
they see through me to you. It's like
we're living in a episode of the Jetsons.

The first time isn't like punching.
A butterfly walking along the line
of your undies, or your tights rolling
down a bit on their own. I keep
checking my elastic until I realise
it's you from the inside.

The first time isn't real until suddenly
in the boredom of spinal numbness
a flurry of hands and forceps
is now my life, is like a tired tree
rocketing leaves and you roar
out of me like a waterfall person.

--------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@josie_is: like punching a butterfly
@JayJayCee1: I'll hear a whisper in my head saying I hope you're not a girl
@poolspy: waterfall person
@ernmalleyscat: now my life is like a tired tree (John Laws, The Tree)
@timsterne: I wouldn't touch you with a plastic one (John Lennon, Help!)
@chantarelle: it's like we're living in an episode of The Jetsons

Monday, January 20, 2014

Month of Poetry #19: Rolling gallstones

To slack and fetid crew, he flailed with
back-door hands and breath full of bin-juice
My boys! My excrellent boys! To fuck with this
not enough pirating! We are rolling
gallstones boys, gathering glory and gore!
Nodding upwards with his broad chin
he brought down ripped sails
dodged hard bits of bird shit
that pinged like a fossilised wedding.
They trudged, jaws askew and raw gums
receding, hardly hearing
We're not in Norwegian waters now,
sunning our arses for snakes, 
well we're not here to fuck! Spiders can make 
webs in your pants and catch those
puny flies that veer at your crusty dags.
He demanded worship of his floral bumhole
so they did as told and sat around the rose.
As criticism does part hairy balls
like rippling farts, so does the stink of attention
from a crowd of seated arses warm the cockles.

------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@dogpossum: not enough pirating
@urbabe: well we're not here to fuck spiders
@ernmalleyscat: and sat around the rose, as criticism does (Gina Rinehart, Criticism)
@JayJayCee1: Not in Norwegian (Dina's Son, Herbjorg Wassmo)
@sleepingdingo: gathering glory and gore
@timsterne: nodding upwards with his broad chin (Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code)


Sunday, January 19, 2014

Month of poetry #18: Best spot near the box

Lord of his Jason recliner, best spot near the box.
He shuddered at residents who shuffled all day
up the passage, around the chow hall, past the baths:
their circular wanderlust secretly disgusted him.

Loved the TV, announced regularly that
"Do what you love" is a secret. Handshake
of the privileged men on the news thrilled him,
brought back days of war and rethinking France.

Alice wandered past in unbridled logohorrea:
"Bicycle, unicycle, unitard, hockey puck, rattle snake,
monkey monkey underpants" then in shock of herself
a brief stop: "Oh dear! What nonsense I am talking!"

No one looked up in surprise, her rabid blather
didn't raise heads (but then here, what does).
Truancy, mean glaring days made long with
empty visitor parking lots: absent notes not required.

He loved the TV: do what you love. Peered through
raised slippers at the World News. In between
camera flashes of the press, he slipped into the
room of journalists and shook hands with the president.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Includes suggestions from:

@ernmalleyscat: wunderlust secretly disgusted him
@marklawrence: Do What You Love is a secret handshake of the privileged
@matchtrick: bicycle, unicycle, unitard, hockey puck, rattle snake, monkey monkey underpants (Gilmore Girls)
@eglantinescake: Oh dear! What nonsense I am talking. (Alice in Wonderland)
@MissButtons_ rethinking France
@timsterne: what does truancy mean?




Saturday, January 18, 2014

Month of poetry #17: May as well be sisters

Both of us slight, quiet and brown, ears
like wingnuts. Whispered sometimes, glancing
at my father, we may as well be sisters.
Stood naked together in the mirror,
aligning similarities of knee and clavicle,
assessing theories of common history.

I called her sister when it seemed
her mam might not make it to Christmas.

My father, his ear welded to the news
shook his head at spouted world targets
in megadeaths that the war promised Japan.
All through the fighting he was part man,
part robot, shellacked one with the radio.
He seemed to understand what it all meant.

My sister and I whispered only one
small death, her tinier mam in that tiny bed.

Most days were marginal, we rolled out
of bed itchy: cursed be the pesty cat that
sprung our mattress with critters and dander.
My mam chased the queen outside and
beat the fleas as if blankets are available
only at the price of leather. She had them boiled alive.

For some gods, stocking wishes only come true
at Christmas. My sister wished for her mam.

It's hard to breath in hospitals, but we stayed.
After sitting close by death, the need for life
refreshes. Automatically every thirty
minutes I saw my sister check her pulse,
pressed my own thumb firm to wrist:
the flesh giving a little, like a ripe cheese.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@matchtrick: refreshes automatically every thirty minutes
@spikelynch: cursed be the pesty cat (marginal note by irate medieval scribe)
@home_sewn: I called her sister
@ernmalleyscat: boiled alive for some god's stocking (Human League, Being boiled)
@realnixwilliams: like ripe cheese
@timsterne: World Targets in Megadeaths (printed on a binder in Dr Strangelove)
@attentive: blankets are available

Friday, January 17, 2014

Month of poetry #16: Hidden folk

We built a soft forest, moss at every freefall
to attract them. Fairies run away from pain
and prick their ears at noises: very clever.
With maracas we shuddered them forth
like May Gibbs' sketches. The fliptop
petals branch up as that hat goes.
Terribly, with your personality it may seem
you cannot see them. Blinded by lights
in Greenborough Plaza, confused by the newly
renamed Brazilian Butterfly (formerly
Moon in Taurus Waxing).
Their plump bottoms and cheeks, loving
fat hands picking always the nearest babies
first from boronia stalks: never the most beautiful.
The closest baby is the best baby, and each
soft-fuzzed parent knows that in this way no
bush baby will ever regret anyone's fall.
Stunned from the fluorescence, you do not
see them. There's something, though:
if not little people, then a line where they
dig their graves with the bladebones of
antelope. Worn to slivers by a pelt of hail,
something that smelled to you like a
building site: dug up by the tiny hands of rain.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@spikelynch: fairies run away from pain (Jo Walton, Among Others)
@ernmalleyscat: very clever with maracas (Brian Eno, Baby's on fire)
@ReadingSheilas: Moon in Taurus, Waxing (The Luminaries)
@xutraa: That hat goes terribly with your personality (woman on the tram)
@timsterne: dig their graves with the bladebones of antelope (Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian)

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Month of poetry #15: Words on a hot night

No end of sweat to the bedtime tale you're telling me.
It's a shambles of plot, a small summery explosion
of superheroes and half-remembered phrases
you heard a screen say. Imagine if we were
super samurai mighty power ranger
horses in the sun! No, in the sun! In the SUN!

Your room built in layers of heat, vinegar of
your head and pillow, honeycomb of
light drifts through toilet-roll constructions.
The remains of Fruit Ninja scattered for nighttime
battleship: this melon blows my tomato
out of the water. My insteps twinge in advance.

The blinds slithers down like tired snakes.
I bop a toy with my sweaty palm: the
bobble-headed-Thor swayed gently.
In the cool air next week he will escort
a pot-bellied alien home from Savers:
We're taking him to his spaceship.

Why do I have to wear shorts tomorrow?
Because it's summer in Australia. Lie down.
Why is Australia so hot?
Right now, because it's summer. Lie down.
A boy said 'fucking stupid racing car'.
That's not very good to say at kinder. No.

Click of the door before he sees me grin.
Still I think it's clever to swear, and
every hot phrase they cook up thrills:
from the first I love you to the well-placed
Fuckers. They're all fuckers. It's not
unwise to stock up on these words in summer.

Tangled sheets and raging air conditioner
dull thumps of sleep-bound feet on the wall.
He's being built out of words, trying on
different sorts of armor and feathers
imagine and what if and fuck off
stockpiling love and fury on a hot night.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@matchtrick: this melon blows my tomato out of the water (The Mitchell and Webb Look)
@ernmalleyscat: I think it's clever to swear (John Cooper Clarke, I don't want to be nice)
@JayJayCee1: We're taking him to his spaceship (E.T.)
@chantarelle: The bobble-headed-Thor swayed gently in the cool air
@timsterne: Why is Australia so hot right now?
@sulphura: You're telling me! It's a shambles
@ReadingSheilas: a small summery

(PS: fuck it's hot.)







Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Month of poetry #14: At the museum

There's one skeleton I'm haunted by the
freakish size of. Nancy Reagan's head
shoved on top of a dinosaur spine
would be less disturbing. It makes me
feel like prey and I hurry under its ribs.
More than you, more than me
is needed to fill that xylophone space.

Electron microscope images
make me nauseous.The smoothest
surface of a pin or hair shaft thus gets
fluffy and greasy, reminds me of all the
skin flakes I cannot shake off. I have
lived a filthy lie of becoming clean,
after which microbes had existed all along.

Animals frozen in their skins fail
to unnerve: hard eyes and stiff paint
fluff them up into toyland plushies
there is nothing frightening in a tiger
that will stand casually next to a pangolin.
Any minute now they'll start up on
a Monty Python routine, with the parrot.

Towards the end there's a room that
drops me into the paperback covers
of furious childhood reading. Learning
Welsh poems and how to say the
double L, the double D: the sounds
fluttering ice in my mouth like a small fish.
Seeking a new religion in every page.

Something about that room of old stones
still makes me into a sign-seeker
skidding on moss and completing a circle:
pursuing the mountains in their singing
with a pure heart, full of goodness and iron.
Y maent yr mynyddoedd yn canu,
ac y mae'r arglwyddes yn don.

------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@lalscotton: Calon lân yn llawn daioni (pure heart full of goodness)
@xutraa: ice in my mouth like a small fish
@attentive: after which microbes had existed all along
@timsterne: I'm haunted by the freakish size of Nancy Reagan's head (Mission of Burma, Nancy Reagan's Head)
@GretaPunch: more than you, more than me
@ernmalleyscat: thus gets fluffy and greasy

If you've read Susan Cooper's Dark is Rising sequence, the end will make a bit more sense. But suffice to say my best friend and I were besotted with those wonderful books in early high school, and (never to do anything by halves) I looked up all the Welsh pronunciations and attempted to do my own literal translation of the poem that runs through the books. The last Welsh lines translate as "The mountains are singing/and the lady comes" (although apparently there's a grammatical error in the use of "maent" there).

And if you haven't read the series: do yourself a favour. But skip the (DREADFUL) movie.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Month of poetry #13: Captain January

Greens, whites and lethargic television,
procession to tennis from the cricket
as a thermometer of diminishing return
audiences. Tickets run cheaper than shade,
the clouds have their own cheer squad.

Mercury lashes like a madman's drum,
demented lover of broil, thrashing in ecstasy
as if beset by some ghast succubus of
bubbling skin and ashen flesh. An idea
of summer flown too close to the sun.

I imagine another landscape under this gleam,
with lavender and orris wilted faster
than the viscous flattening of Clyde Bruckman's
final repose; larch, pine and willow followed
into shuddering black by a hot town.

Summer in the city, and there's cleavage,
cleavage, cleavage. Lethargy wears tiny shorts
in my kingdom. For a dollar or two
I watch my baby fumble about an icy pole;
marvel at those white legs, fat against the glare.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@ernmalleyscat: The Cricket as a Thermometer (1897 article by Amos Dolbear)
@chantarelle: my kingdom for a
@JayJayCee1: larch, pine and willow followed
@home_sewn: with lavender and orris
@MissButtons_: Clyde Bruckman's final repose
@spikelynch: madman's drum (title of a wordless 1930s novel by Lynd Ward)
@miguelpotts: Hot town, summer in the city
@timsterne: beset by some ghast succubus (Cormac McCarthy, Child of God)

(the lines in italics are from the Regina Spektor song 'Summer in the City')



Monday, January 13, 2014

Month of Poetry #12: An attitude of existence

There was no dramatic rollercoaster down
to the first night on cardboard in the park.
Instead, homelessness was a deep mouth
pooling with salt at a slow river's end.
It was in his nature: believing what he did
was the only possible thing he could have done.
He lay passive in the gentle stream of shit
that flowed across his face: a fly in the temple
of unlucky ointment, a spy in the house of
excrement. Never raged against drowning.
When his enrolment form slipped the administrative
cracks instead of marching to university
he simply never went back.  When unpaid bills
broke in on love, he fated the passion failed.
The last piece of camel spine: a studio squat,
toilet-less and borrowed from artist on leave
was never meant to last. When the painter
returned, he did not mention the real-estate
shaped hole in his universe. And so he
was sunk down to wherever it was,
grown impossible with acceptance.
Cold, under the stars, but unprotesting
he ran his eyes over The Adventures of Augie March
until the sun sank offshore. Later in the evening
his friends would circle in on a net of texts,
sluice him squinting to his feet.
He would look at each of them in turn, unsurprised.




-------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@JayJayCee1: down to wherever it was (Herbjorg Wassmo, Dina's Son)
@timsterne: a spy in the house of excrement (Helen Garner, The Feel of Steel)
@ernmalleyscat: offshore later in the evening


Sunday, January 12, 2014

Month of poetry #11: A Natural Death

i.
And there's poor Mr Barton
very old and very relaxed
only dead in there perhaps
two weeks but if you asked
he couldn't really say not least because
he's dead.

ii.
Winter's chill and isolation will mute
the smell
and really he does give a
tremendous performance of being alive
blending into bed with all the
activity of sleep.

iii.
Natural evacuations are nothing to
be embarrassed about
early on a hot flush triggered some
little visitors
whose curious feet played laptop football
near his dark zipper.

iv.
The roots start to cradle his
forest coffin
those mutinous dreadlocks worming
like sea anemones
about his toes
gentle vines winding silky soliloquies
in his hairy ears.

v.
First the walls will warp
and shift like a deck of cards
then the roof will follow.
In its own time, the body of Mr Barton will
quietly turn
to skin on the wind, eager with its
promise of invisibility
or flight.



---------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@JayJayCee1: a hot flush triggered
@sleepingdingo: silky soliloquies
@ernmalleyscat: then the roof will follow in its own time (Vincent van Gough, letter to Theo 21/3/1883)
@matchtrick: invisibility or flight
@spikelynch: laptop football
@jazir1979: those mutinous dreadlocks
@timsterne: a tremendous performance of being alive (Helen Garner, The Spare Room)
@sulphura: and there's poor Mr Barton (Midsomer Murders)






Saturday, January 11, 2014

Month of poetry #10: Red

It was an agreement in the end: his claws
sheathed with such force if you saw
you would make fists with your toes.
Her promise silent flowing from her chest
like stolen wine had dulled her mouth.

How it began: a red hoodie and rose
petal jam like a jar of lips. Flittery
by reputation: you're a here and therein
Her teeth: grinding like sand behind my ear.
But she knew her strength: she was no little red.

If fairy tales were up front, you would
first choose your payment method:
blood or children. Wolves don't carry
EFTPOS systems and it's proven
difficult to commodify grandmas.

So into the grey metal world, she tripped
that adamantine, that iron shod plain
like a little prairie. Hello dusk,
she crowed, Hello stars and unafraid.
He trailed her like a sister wolf, she knew.

Near the house she turned and led the dog
inside, took off both their leashes.
His surprised paws kneaded her puppylike,
they knew that after great pain,
a formal feeling comes this way only once.

Only in the tales of men do hunters kill
the wolf. If no one ever lives to tell the tale
then how does the tale get out? In stories
where wolves survive they howl
until the trees remember.

He felt her silent goodbye, her checking:
can you hear me? His muzzle lifted yes.
She remembered how she had touched the
naked wolf and whispered sometimes 
it's good to play with your food.


-------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions (many many suggestions) from:

@matchtrick: flowing from her chest like stolen wine
@pinknantucket: If no one ever lives to tell the tale, then how does the tale get out? (Supernatural)
@ReadingSheilas: After great pain, a formal feeling comes (Emily Dickinson)
@spikelynch: Hello, stars
@chantarelle: can you hear me?
@sleepingdingo: rose petal jam
@home_sewn: sand behind my ear
@ernmalleyscat: that adamantine, that iron shod plain (journal of Charles Sturt, written as weekly letters to wife Charlotte)
@timsterne: fists with your toes (Die Hard)
@eglantinescake: sometimes it's good to play with your food (Keri Smith)
@suznannah: you're a here and thereian (Georgette Heyer)
@attentive: first choose your payment method

Friday, January 10, 2014

Month of poetry #9: Shopping centre

Four hours under fluorescents on the
day before Christmas: I call shopped out.
My vision splits into fractals and that
thing where you're supposed to like
shopping: I've flunked it bad.
Lulled into confusion by piped-in
waterborn music, I drift like a pool spy
with no liquid assignment. Coke-floated.
These massive centres dazzle with overkill
only mass marketing can provide,
on the 26th of December Santa
will disappear up the air vent
replaced by hot cross buns and bunny ears.
Shops juxtaposed by some evil genius
Pets Wonderland next to Schnitz
in case I want a schnauzer with my
weiner schnitzel. It's like shopping centres
jumped the shark and then the shark became the PM.
Jump cut and I'm in a toy section,
assessing fluff. Rows of kitties with wings,
I remember the poem about
the flying cat, or was it Chuck Jones or
Ursula le Guin and why are they still staring?
Wide-eyed plushy bunnies goggle,
and bobble their heads sideways
each as innocent as their countrymen.
The huge tortoises turn out to be a
toilet training seat-and-stool combo
and I've that's it I've backed out.


------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@johnnypurple: and then the shark became the PM
@attentive: waterborn music (Nifft the Lean)
@spikelynch: I call shopped
@ernmalleyscat: as innocent as their countrymen the huge Tortoises (log of Charles Darwin, Beagle)
@poolspy: pool spy
@timsterne: I want a schnauzer with my weiner schnitzel (Top Secret)
@JayJayCee1: the poem about the flying cat
@gingerandhoney: flunked it bad

Thursday, January 9, 2014

Month of poetry #8: Too close to home

We only half-expected to catch fish.
Two early pick-ups left the nature strips
behind: the oleanders and snow apples
and wet roads at dawn led to our river camp.
First things first: wrigglers shoved on hooks,
six-packs nestled in sandy wet pools.
The actual fish was a shock: brilliant, molten
and too alive, dancing through the stunned grass.
We froze and leaped like we'd ourselves
been pulled roughly into another world.
My sister's boyfriend made it still at last, and
undressed it neatly for dinner.
We remembered that story, Carver,
with the body and the river, and how they
kept on fishing. So much water.
By the time we wrestled parachute tents
and whacked in off-kilter pegs, the world
yellowed and desperate cicadas sang along
with our Eagles covers. It had been my
idea to glamp up the food, and I placed
my bare eggplant in charcoal with
misplaced flourish. The verdict was quietly
unanimous, until like the fish he put it blunt:
Dude, seriously, tastes just like sawdust. 
At least the fish passed muster and we
made a very acceptable soup from her bones,
parsley, and a lone carrot.
The sun, a long time caught in the trees,
disentangled and left our day still pink.
I wandered, trailing my fingers through
the midges and dangling a slack beer
to the water's edge. Easy breaths.
In focus: the water parted around
a lump in the river, heavy and wrinkled
dark and I could see hair, a knee.
My toes curled into the sand I pressed
out into the water, dropped the beer
my shouts coming back at me from the rocks
until it flipped. Lazy turn in the water,
the hair slipped away and turned grass
the knee reared and I saw bark
as the log dislodged, rolled. I rested my
palms flat on the water like I stood in glass.




---------------------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@spikelynch: desperate cicadas
@xutraa: oleanders and snow apples and wet roads at dawn
@pinknantucket: dude, seriously (Supernatural)
@timsterne: tastes just like sawdust (Ren and Stimpy, Powdered Toast Ad)
@ernmalleyscat: and we made a very acceptable soup from her bones (log of Douglas Mawson, Christmas eve 2012)
@JayJayCee1: eggplant in charcoal


Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Month of poetry #7: Ultimate floor

You led him away, one hand in glove
peaceable, the other full of insects.
If tonight you don't say bedtime
over mountain-climbing, who will?
Get the final rose from the top
of summer's flowers, never mind
scratches on the way back down.
Coiled rope in my guts twisted
like an experienced boy scout;
tested against history and the wind.
Uneasiness: it's my signature.
Move one step forward: one step into
a wall of nerves and flesh this was.
My ultimate floor was level with death,
his face you might mistake for a demon
or the golden crane, stayed, that needed to fly.



---------------------------------------------------
Including suggestions from:

@ernmalleyscat: this was my ultimate floor (from the log of William Beebe, deep sea explorer)
@spikelynch: hand in glove
@JayJayCee1: the golden crane stayed
@timsterne: who will get the final rose?
@lalscotton: it's my signature move


Tuesday, January 7, 2014

Month of poetry #6: Winter

It's late and my wrist aches like I'm the first
to hold a pen in centuries. I had raked words
into piles like the dry leaves and twigs
of summer's reaping, then let them spoil into
dank mushroom-fanciers. Rancid undercurrents
festering ripe and sprouting fairy rings of
rote exposition. I cower inkless during winter,
there is nothing rude to shade me from
the goths of near-July. Pick axes slam into picked apart
taxes of snowy white-goods. These are no
flurries of natural season, a freezer is no roof-line
of ice that fell in apology. Throwing June's money
at the cold is hard as a cannonball to resist
unless you are a cannonball. My advice would be
for people not to climb into appliances as if they
chill and boil happiness. They are no points
of power; will not bring back summer where
we wrote and drank white trash in the sun.



------------------------------------------------------
Includes suggestions from:

@timsterne: the dry leaves and twigs of summer's reaping (The Young Desire It, Kenneth MacKenzie)
@_boobook_: it's late and my wrist aches (Lighthouse Girl, Dianne Wolfer)
@sleepingdingo: rancid undercurrents festering
@sushipyjamas: shade me from the goths
@JayJayCee1: unless you are a cannonball (Richard Scarry)
@attentive: fell in apology
@dogpossum: my advice would be for people not to climb into appliances

Monday, January 6, 2014

Month of poetry #5: Commercial service - 3 out of 5 stars

Unseen hands on housekeeping trolley
firm knocks/pause/keys/nose the door open
with buttocks and back into the room.
Four-piece queen suites disrobed of dust
under pain of white-gloved fingers from upstairs.

Midnight room service slides sideways into
strobe-lit back to back Avengers,
four women shouting at primary flashes
screening in red/white/blue/green
"What the fuck, heroes, what the fuck?"

Breakfast starts at four. Head of service
queens it over grain breads and sweet jams
props up on years of coffee and
loves every wrinkle on each croissant
and face. Avenging the title of senior.

Front desk shone chestnut colour
polished into history with years of
nasty/brutish/short wages, generations of fingers
tagging the grain into macrocosm of oils
invisible hands wearing away a tree.



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Includes suggestions by:

@ernmalleyscat: four-piece queen suites
@ReadingSheilas: 3 out of 5 stars
@JayJayCee1: shone chestnut colour
@chantarelle: what the fuck, Heroes, what the fuck?

I've always been interested in how hotels work, and the people seen and unseen who work there. Interviews with workers in these places are often amazing and mind-boggling. I even made the mistake of watching several seasons of Hotel Babylon based on this interest of mine. Admittedly, this was also because Dexter Fletcher (Spike from Press Gang) was in it. But either way, I wouldn't advise it.