Melbourne downpour

means it takes everyone

hours to get home

I am safe and dry in my car

end of irritating work day

Restless and bored

Flicking through radio stations

I select the most popular

commercial drive team

There must be

a reason why

millions tune in every day

Within twenty minutes

I hear the drive team duo

a recap from breakfast

and a promo for the next show

Their voices are

hoppy beer on a hot day

creamy chocolate

a bubble bath for my ears

their words are big

fat bright shiny

glowing lies

about themselves

about the world

about the intimate

and down to earth relationship

they have with me, the listener

about how similar they are to me

and how far removed they are

from that mendacious

world of celebrity

Their lies

are so crunchy and

delectable

that I want to eat them all up

told with such brazen joy

that I long for them

to be true

Each lie is worth

more than my day’s entire work

ballooning their already

brimming bank accounts

inflating their already

elephantine egos

I drive on

the rain

steaming up

my car

I want to believe them

as much as I wanted to believe

that boy murmuring

sweet lies

in the rain

steaming up

his car

so many years ago

We want to believe the lies

but once you arrive

and open the car door

and step outside

you are alone

with only your voice

resounding



I wait at a red traffic light

and see

two men sitting on a bench

One – dark haired

and swarthy wears a blue shirt

leans forward

arms resting on knees

The other – blonde

with sweeps of grey

yellow shirt

smokes a cigarette

They do not speak

Two men of middling years

with lives that carried them

to this Thursday morning

muggy grey summer day aching for rain

With lives that will

propel them on again

once this brief pause

in their day is done

In my story

they are little more

than featured extras

a snapshot I will carry

            - until the memory fades

But for this moment

-         car in neutral foot on brake, waiting to keep moving

they are the perfect shape

of contentment



a man with

a gaunt face

and stringy black hair

is approached

by a polite

Indian fellow

blue checked shirt

tucked into jeans

The first man is

sitting at the computer

terminal that the second

man has booked

Outside it is day two

of a Melbourne summer

heat wave

fast approaching

forty degrees

Many of us have chosen

the library as shelter

from the angry elements

The gaunt man

is not going to move

his face closed and hostile

someone took the computer

where he was going to sit

A third man

also Indian

a busy staff member

young and funky in

a Jackson Five t-shirt

diffuses the heat

finds another terminal

for the polite

waiting

fellow

In the foyer of the library

a stack of local newspapers

show images of the

memorial service

for a local Indian student

recently murdered

No-one in the article

can be sure that the

attack was racially

motivated

The melting pot

of Melbourne’s west

always simmers

and can rise to the boil

with violent surprise

But today

in this place of respite

things

are

cool



confirms that the reigns of power

will be handed on a platter

from the baby boomers

to Generation Y

Gen X

now and forever

the Jan Brady

of time

the awkward

middle child

Profiles of six

up and coming

Gen Y  about to turn  thirty

reveal a yawning mediocrity

I want to travel some more

I’m not ready to settle down

My friends are important to me

The minutiae of these

lives is not mediocre

to those living them

The yawning malaise

lies in the fact

that this is front page news

Are we so numbed

by warming and terror

catastrophe and technology

that we could not

find six up and coming Gen Y

with passion to burn

and desire in their eyes

for what may be possible?

This is no revolution

this is no overturn

this is a global reading of the will

from one generation to their offspring

Designed to anaesthetise

gloss over the damage done

the wrong turns took

Look!

You don’t even have to fight for it

The power’s yours

We’re off to spend our Super

Good luck with this thing called Planet Earth



The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,

And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it,

And ceased the moment life appeared.

All goes onward and outward ... and nothing collapses,

And to die is differnt from what anyone supposed, and is luckier.

Those words are from Leaves of Grass (Song of Myself).

Old Walt has that peculiar shining insight that is the gift of true depressives. He struggled a lot with life and so you can believe his fervour when he finds things to celebrate and be hopeful and thankful for.

Happy New Year 2010.

May we all find light and fervour in the most unexpected of places.

Christmas whispered

Now

it shouts

There used to be orange cicadas

green ones of course

their sci-fi heads

and chirping legs

but orange ones

I don’t know if they make them any more

there were wild plums

spilled and stained

on the footpath

we picked them from the trees

from the moment they were

just beyond too green

and risked stomach ache

by eating 1-2-3

I think there were

even black ones

cicadas that is

not plums

where did we find them?

secreted in the garden

wandering along window sills

they seem such a wild

and exotic thing now

but then they were part

of every day life

in sprinkler soundtrack

itch of cooch grass

wall climbing

bitumen burning

tin roof scrambling

white hot clothes line drying

panting dog

shimmer

and by the end of summer

we had a collection

of brittle brown shells

artifacts

trophies

weapons with which to

scare each other

finding them perched

on shoulders

creeping through hair

waiting in cool bed sheets

upstairs was hot and stifling

we all slept on the floor

in the lounge room

when nights got too hot

there was no air conditioning

just a brick house

with a slate verandah

and steps leading down

to the front path

lined with roses

that were pruned every year

and bloomed

and there were orange cicadas

and black ones too

they were special

enough to score points

but not so rare as to be worth

reporting to anyone

other than ourselves

not so rare

and yet I’ve not seen

a single one since

leaving childhood

do they make them that way

any more?



the bathtub too

The grass is long in the paddock

There is no shade there so I do not sit and contemplate the loss

I keep walking, my skin throbbing in the heat

while I grapple with the title of a poem

I have not yet written

about whether this need for fulfillment

can ever be sated

Did the horse die or did they just move it to greener pastures?

He doesn't have to say them, sometimes they just grunt and ask how often you floss.

But today, he must be able to sense the extra level of stamina it took to stay sitting in that chair.

He shakes my hand and as we part, he smiles and says:

'Well done today'

the celebrities

all to one place?

Because the problem is not

so much that they exist

-         all right, I get it, people like them, it makes them feel safe or that things are in their right place

the problem is

that they pop up everywhere

their whitened teeth and maniacal grins

and ironic humour and

over developed senses of self

frightening those of us who are looking for something else

-         some other anchor or balloon in life

They leak into waters where they are not supposed to be

infecting art and literature

seeping into home cooking

clawing their tentacles across

dog walking and tree planting and adventure hiking and asylum seeking

Leaving no place sacred any more for the ordinary

unremarkable unrecognisable quiet ticking

not much happening here thanks and we like it that way

of what used to pass for every day life

So here’s what I think

We take them

-         lure them, trick them, drug them, beat them, promise them, herd them, flatter them, feed them – however we get them there I don’t care, there are smart people around who know what to do, how to motivate and move them, satisfy and soothe them, just get them into ONE place and cyclone fence it and guard dog it and electromagnify it and then shut the gigantic gate and lock it

And we will still watch them

that channel will run 24/7

- more if that smart person can work out how to pummel extra hours into each day

So they will be on – they will always be on – so they won’t feel sad or strange or bad and the people who need to see them don’t have to pine or whine or panic or go mad

But for the rest of us

-         those who have had to stop turning on the TV and opening the paper and walking out the door and going to the market for fear of the constant bombardment of their insidious smiling presence (“Oh look at me! I once learned some words off by heart and they put me on the telly and now I have an opinion about everything from Al Jazirah to jelly!”)

For us

finally

there may be

some peace

Cause we know that channel’s there

and we can turn it on

those dark lonely nights when we miss their shiny lights

But the rest of the time

we can get back

to the ordinary chaos

of our blissfully uninteresting, monotonous, uncelebrated

lives