Two Poems (December 20, 2010. Issue 23.)
More Contemporary Lies
You can stay as long as you like.
You look slim in that skirt.
There are no sharks on this beach.
This house will never decline in value.
We will never ever raise taxes.
Our leader has our total support.
Globalisation has been of enormous benefit to this nation.
We are deeply concerned about climate change.
We can defeat the enemy if we send more troops.
Democracy is at stake here.
This was never about oil.
The war on drugs can be won.
This business is too big to fail.
This bank needs propping up with tax payer funds.
The stimulus package will restart the economy.
Capitalism is not rigged in favour of big business.
The tapas are good value here.
You look great in that top.
No, your ass hasn’t fallen.
I really love your pastel landscapes.
Horses that Shit in the Woods Eat Sushi at Dawn
the skid row poet
cum multi-millionaire
another used condom of
his poems recently released
the fourteenth since his death
the proverbial scrapping of the barrel:
cigar butts, Ludwig, pussy, beer.
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Two Poems (March 20, 2010. Issue 15. The DirtyDirty)
Writing Poetry On Stilnox
The beauty of the sleeping pill Stilnox
is that you can take it & sleepwalk
smoke
paint
fuck
drive
write
& you will not remember* *ANYTHING
the next day.**
Take poetry as an example.
I swallowed the recommended dosage
printed on the box (500mg)
typed
laced words together
molded meaning
listened to itunes
& sometime near morning crashed out.
I awoke with mouse still in hand
without any recollection
of the previous night’s events
of what I had written.
On the computer screen
appeared a crudely drawn sketch
of a man
he appeared to be urinating into the air,
his penis erect.
I repeat, I have absolutely no recollection
nor take any responsibility for writing the poem
which appeared below it:
HOW TO PISS WITH A HARDON
1. Stand back approximately 2 feet from a toilet bowl or sink.
2. Aim to the left of the intended target in a curved trajectory of
approximately 170◦
3. Lean forward at least 80◦
4. Remove clothing.
5. Release urine.
6. Correct the trajectory of the flow as required.
Bazza's Buck Night
They me tell
I lost it
after a dozen or so beers.
They tell me
I grabbed the stripper
& twirled her in the air
until we broke through the fibro flooring.
They tell me
she removed my glasses
& inserted them in & out of her vagina
and then placed them back crookedly on my face.
They tell me
they took plenty of photos.
They tell me
Richie sucked clean her used dildos
before the wash up.
They tell me
the stripper told Ritchie
that no one had ever done that before.
They tell me
he reckoned she tasted SWEET AS.
They tell me the next day
it was a top night.
As we were waiting for the marriage ceremony to begin
Bazza & his dad smirk & inquire about my glasses.
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Buk (October 20, 2009. Issue 10.)
why the reverence?
why the adulation?
he couldn’t write for shit
you could drive a semi-trailer
through his obvious intent, through
the subtlety of his self aggrandisement.
yeah, tokenly, every book or 2
he could create a diamond
but usually he sat in his underwear
scratching his fat ass &
reworking the same poem
two or three thousand times-
on the race track, fucking ugly
women, bar room brawls, circa 1962
giving a hand job to any reader
who picked up any one of his books.
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Two Poems (September 21, 2009. Issue 9.)
One Clear Winged Morning
For years, I understood poetry
to be the work of flabby grey men
in pompous suits & ties
pouring over obscure lines
in heavily annotated books
mocking each other’s poetics.
But then one clear winged morning
I discovered that it can be found anywhere:
in the shell of a burnt out car
in the automated voice of a train guard
on the side of trucks or bathroom doors
belted out in pubs or on factory floors
Friends
My friends have died in various,
ungodly, unkind ways. Ronny was the
first to go at 14- caught in a freak whirlpool
in Lake Monroe. Beans soon followed, dog
paddling. Frantic. A bottle of Southern
Comfort under his belt. Larry, the big tough
wop was fried at 26. Electrocuted dismantling
a kitchen. Raymond was shot by a narc thru
the windshield attempting to run him over.
Bob was decapitated driving his Norton
Commando thru a misplaced low-hung
sign on the side of the road near San Air.
Mel deliberately ran in front of a truck on
Rue St Jacques chased by her boyfriend who
caught her giving head to a guy at a party.
Joanne died from a severe haemorrhage after
a caesarean. Thoreau choked on his own
drunken vomit. Crowbar froze to death in
a doorway in Old Montreal. Pud died from
an aneurism. Toe from a massive stroke on
his paper run. Roger collapsed after downing
one last 2 litre bottle of Coke, his thorax cancerous.
Wally died in our backyard in the true
Australian way- under the Hills Hoist
binge drinking. 35 stubbies. Aged 37.
Oh, I almost forget, Nick hearing voices,
entered a construction site on Pitt Street,
climbed eight floors of scaffolding and
with arms outstretched angel-like, flew
to a splattered mess on the footpath below.
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Three Poems (June 20, 2009. Issue 6.)
Redefining It
The words
stumble out…
uncertain
hesitant
groping for some kind of angle
anything to reach her
in persuading her to stay
‘I love you- I really mean it’, he lies,
‘I’m not bullshitting this time.’
He adopts a well rehearsed earnest frown
& strokes her teenage hand like a likeable pet.
Imperceptively, in the tense gloom
he senses a pause, a slight shift of feeling
& he knows he has won a reprise
however briefly- once again!
They kiss swirling, sliding tongue on tongue
& suddenly she has his face in her mouth
& she is on top of him-
He is strangely detached
almost disembodied-
cool as a wintry southerly
sweeping up from the Strait-
whose wild gusts jar & redefine you.
The Lighthouse
At night. The mundane slamming of car boots.
The repetitive rattle of beer bottles into bins. Laughter.
The quick breathing of our young son in the tent.
In the bright blotter dawn
I take in the lighthouse on the headland,
from the north sandstone cliffs of the bay
the waves foaming/ surging onto the shore.
And as I focus on another breaker the rolling tube
seems to shatter into a chaotic
spew of letters.
Astonishingly, it is as if the wave-
& now scanning the entire bay- is one big jumble of letters,
jiggling in the changing light and colour: an alphabet soup of meaning,
words
the bay
forming & then splintering
infinitely reinventing itself.
Surrey Hills on a Saturday Night
Perhaps he was in the wrong end of town
at the wrong time of night
some accidental nudge
or wayward drunken glance
or sly comment about someone’s girlfriend
perhaps he was deliberately targeted
a goon spilling a drink on him, a forceful shove
yet there was a certain inevitability to what was to happen
when the men were flushed from the ornate doors of the hotel
onto Cleveland Street it was certain from the start who was to win.
I had forgotten how an expertly kicking leather boot on skull sounds.
It has a surprising metallic cling, ‘THWANG! THWACK!’
his head was badly bleeding and being beaten brutally
he freakishly laughed & stupidly blurted from the footpath,
‘Is that the best you wankers can do?’
‘THWANG! THWACK!’
We witness this savagery from across the street.
More boots hit home. Connecting viciously.
My girlfriend is horrified & screams out,
‘DO SOMETHING! HELP HIM!’
These guys know what they are doing. They know how to hurt.
They seem to be enjoying it. They aren’t finished yet.
‘You gotta be fucking joking’, I say, as we head to the MC
battle at the Oxford Art Factory.
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