In a Day
In a day the clouds hung in the sky like a great grey
last light of the day finished for once and for all
scientists would say it was simply the earth turning
around the sun to bring this twilight but it was just
something else a certain feel a sadness as thoughts
of mortality overcame you of loved ones and why we
fight and scrabble upon this rocky earth until in the
end it means nothing as lives are lived in acceleration
needing wanting more and more when in the end it
comes to naught there is nothing else only this and
if you watched nature it would tell you how to live
calmly being with the earth but no you fight you take
you attack everyday in this day in a day.
The Pub
We came in alone and we went out alone and
not a soul helped us leave that place even though
my father had helped out people in so many
ways when he had the place paid for a barman's
dental work and IVF treatment and let people
run up tabs to the kazoo and cashed cheques for
them oh they tried to kill us there not literally
but robbing the soul the night my father was
attacked against the wall outside being bettered
by a younger man until i stopped the fight with
with one punch thrown and the other time a man
lined my father up with a bar stool only to be then
ejected from there so i had heard and we remained
even those around us had died just blokes at the
bar to some but blokes nonetheless counting five or
six? and the business went arse up with the landlord
bringing in a pub doctor to keep revenue flowing
in as we moved out and i used the ute killing it in
the process with furniture from the many rooms
upstairs loaded up and ran down the road to another
place my parents got old there but i still carry on to
live another day we all live another day.
The Final Truth
The final truth is Captain Cook found Botany Bay by
chance in a floating hulk the Endevour in Australia the
the final truth is on landing the soldiers pulled the convict
women that were chained underneath the deck out and
raped them in the night while drinking rum the final truth
is they killed aboriginals that came near the camp the final
truth is Cook himself committed murder the following day
by musket fire the final truth is aboriginals thought they were
ghosts and perhaps they were not belonging to this land in
this place the final truth is they were intruders in 1770 the
final truth is aboriginals were chained to trees their women
raped the final truth is the English were murderers stealing
any land they could by killing the aboriginals that lived there.
A Gambler Needs
Once i won on two horses with wizard names in a row
it was not by chance it was not by luck it was by feel
and six hundred dollars later thought had something
for it and another time put one dollar in a pokie by
chance and won a grand it was not by chance it was
not by luck it was by feel and you think that the
Japanese horse Red Wings was by luck too? no it was
by feel five hundred dollars later easy money you think
no the feel comes when you least expect it theres no
accounting for it not by chance not by luck but by feel.
The Bald Hills
It was known to the locals as that because it wasn't a town
more of a place name and every place has a name even if
you have to make it up because thats what we do and here
we lived in mud brick and cold slate floor with a fire place
a foot long only lighting the middle and the horses we kept
ran in moonlight outside the glass wall as you kept dark
little chickens for eggs and grew dope in the vegetable patch
as helicopters flew over and you ran the dirt roads in bare
feet where the car tyres ran leaving it smooth and your heart
bet in your chest and you could have run forever then in those
days as you carted hay in the summertime for the neighbors
and had your first girlfriend with rose bud lips as you rode
dirt bikes to a constant rev also making pontoons on a dam
below like the different weather there just there as black wild
rabbits skirted the edge of bush and the legend of hermit
through the scrub got your mind thinking like the ones up
the road with wild guinea pigs under the house bred from a
son pets who had died they kept as a memory to him as this
as in all things left a mark on you and you on it.
By Land By Sea By Air
The cessna plane cut out somewhere above the sea
it was my boss Taff telling the pilot to switch the
engine off for a kick and all i heard was the wind
as he shouted lets see if the apprentice likes this
as i felt a strange calm come over me telling myself
they were just a glider after all damn Taff for fun he
would sledge hammer remote telephone boxes to
collect all the coin he had jars at home with gold
coins from his pillages and another thing he did
was to put a fake police light on his car roof and
pretend to be a cop pulling people over to speed
off quickly he would cut himself on purpose in
the kitchen to get time off work crazy man and
made it his life mission to go to every massage
parlour in metropolitan Melbourne it became a
point of pride with him saying to me i know all the
knock shops apprentice and he was married to the
most beautiful girl with two little girls at home
who i remember being sick which he couldn't at
all handle at the time he once knew an old German
guy with a genuine Luger pistol he wanted to sell
for seven hundred from WW2 the guy was some
sort of ex soldier under the third Reich so i didn't
see him much when i left he was on his own trip
damn Taff crazy man.
SHONE
Come as you are as a friend as i want you to be and i swear
i dont have a gun played on the radio as we kissed in the back
seat of the datsun SX in the pine forest at Lake Eildon and
we were all so young on the edge of adulthood and life was a
future unlimited oh and what happened to you? where did
you go? where did you end up? the night was sweet and so were
you summer time and water skiing in the day so brilliant or
shining thats it you shone and so did i we shone.
Strange Times
I am told to counter the attacks on Israel with things called
drones...always wonder now do we get to see the Queen?
Is love
I am told to counter the wars in the states of Russia
and Ukraine is freshly cut flowers given to someone
I am told to counter earthquakes in New York City is the
laughter from a new born baby
I am told to counter North Korea launching rockets into
the sea of Japan is freshly baked bread
I am told to counter all the mass stabbings and shootings
is a loving look from the one you love
I am told there is nothing sacred in this world anymore that
it has all been found
I am told that it has been broken apart and examined this
sacred and put together somehow wrong
I am told these things and even after all this i still believe
in the hidden things the special things
I am told black holes are being discovered in open space
and swallowing stars
I am told all this and still believe in life.
Not Like Johnny Cash
I walked the yellow line up top but
Not like Johnny Cash around the top
Of the jack up barge laying gas
Pipe to Tasmania in the seas of
Bass Strait to be choppered in
Twelve in a helicopter over the
White capped ocean to work in
The galley below as at night you
Looked into the bowel to see lines of welders light up sparks on the pipe
In the darkness as it was fed to the
Stinger out back to the sea floor
One tonne per section per pipe as
It was laid in a rhythm back and
Forth to the water as you came
From fields and forest around a
Farm boy with your eyes open wide
As I walked the yellow line up top
But not like Johnny Cash.
Geckos
The sweat hung off everything
As coloured geckos crawled up
The wall while I drank beer and
Sweated in the tropical heat
Never getting hardly drunk
Oh what is that I had asked as
These things raced vertically
Straight up wall paper after
Flies oh they're just geckos mate
Ah right ok and what do you
Do with them? They're too hard
To catch too fast bloody things
Right ok as the blue streaked
Beast darted and wove around
The kitchen as more beer was
Had one more time.