I’m living like a fisherman.
I’m living like a fucking tramp
I’m living by the light of moon
and under the blue light heroin lamp.
I’m living like a footy star
I’m living in the way of cars
I’m living my collisions
Living my decisions.
Living the conditions
that I set for us.

I’m living like a poet.
I’m living like I’ve blown it.
I’m living like I’ve wasted all my dosh
and got nothing left to show for it.
I’m living like Scrooge McDuck.
I’m living, I’m the living FUCK
Trying to screw the world on some deal
Or some messianic seal
that I’ll break
Because I’m living like a saint.

And I’m living like a Brother.
And I’m living under cover
of searchlights and traffic moving
on Mustamae Tee.
I’m living by the river.
I’m living for my liver.
I’m living to a quiver, and a slither and a fault.
I’m living by the law of asphalt.

I’m living by the sea.
Living for the SHE
a thousand years in the making
I’m living for the taking
and the earth all a quaking
in the shadows of the trees.

And I’m living like a disease
Living where and when I please
I’m living in the way a virus lives.
I’m spreading my plague.
I’m making way for the way to come.
I’m living from sun to star to sun.
I’m living like a philosopher.
I’m living like a man.

I’m living by the sword
But dying by the hand.

I’m living how a bugbear lives.
I’m living like the dreams a fever gives.
I’m living like someone who needs that and this
And I’m living like a shift
In weather, in tide, in the faces of the moon
I’m living like a preacher speaking of doom.

I’m living for all the things we haven’t said yet.
I’m living to rebuild the destroyed and the dead.
I’m living like a corpse.
I’m living like a racehorse.
I’m living on the water’s course.
I’m living. I’m living.

I’m living like a nation
and that dream that is dreamt by patriots
Fought over by bronze-clad men in chariots
Sung and danced to by marionettes.

I’m living like a man in a show full of animals.
I’m living in the dark heart with cannibals.

I am living like a beach.
Living each day to each
And stretching my heart to its limit
In view of the morrow.

I’m singing that it’s cold outside
its cold outside, it’s cold outside, tonight.
Tonight the stars like ice hang in the sky
and its cold outside, its cold outside, its cold.

I’m drowning, you see
in the warm sea.
Stripped and starving
and darkling.
Its cold outside, its cold outside, its cold outside
tonight, its cold outside,
I’m singing.

My memory is getting cruel tonight,
cruel tonight, cruel tonight,
And my heart like hangs like a weight
my fingers shake
My memory is cruel tonight, cruel tonight,
cruel tonight, it has
broken
me.

I’m giving in, giving up, moving out, moving in
trying to press my skin to the hand sign of
the world, dressed in white, imparted with great knowledge.
And its dead outside, it’s dead outside
its dead quiet, it’s dead quiet,
the quiet is like it’s dead tonight.

And it’s cold.
And its cruel
And its quiet like the dead outside
and the stars are wet with crystalline dew
and they’ve been hung out to dry, been hung out to dry,
been hung out to cry
in the heaven that weeps for none tonight.

The tear that is shed in love tonight,
the things said about love this night,
the tastes I have had of wine this night,
lips I would kiss on the other side
of dreams I dream in the cold tonight,
and its cold tonight, cruel, quiet and cold tonight
it’s cold tonight and I feel like

a faded man, out of phase, out of step
a jaded man, out of heart and out of breath.
a created man, out of god and out of a womb
a faked man, out of man and out of doom
a naked man, a forsaken man, a played man, a made man,
the main man, the same man as yesterday
a named man, named the same yesterday.

It’s cold tonight, it’s cold tonight,
it’s cold today, dawn has come
but the warms not here
and no sounds come knocking at my ear
its cold and cruel and quiet tonight
its cold and cruel and quiet today.

But I still love the green eyed lady.
In the cold tonight, the cold tonight,
I’m singing, that’s what I do,
Singing the sky in black hues
It’s cold and the stars are among the
dark clouds too
singing
loving
you.

You’re kissing the tracks left on your skin by your last lay like they contained some precious nectar and you’re a stingless bee.

You’ve been drawing the curtains closed at night sooner than you used to and your neighbors can’t smell the oily meat you have been cooking.

You’ve smiled a harsh smile and delivered your sweet justice.

Your outrage silenced a quarrel.

You sit at the dinner table telling stories of mostly how someone offended you.

You will clasp silently you yourself as you are encrypted.

Your tomb will weather the beat of a hailstorm.

You thrust your tongue into another’s mouth.

You took my breath away.

You held hands, in a circle, at the altar, the newspaper photographed you smiling, hiding your scars.

You will bathe naked in the deep waters of midnight.

You fucked someone you didn’t know.

Your phone rang, you topped up your credit, you bough a sweet pastry.

You lost yourself on these streets.

You will consult a fae-eyed clairvoyant to commune with someone you resented or didn’t understand.

In the end, someone will speak for you when words fail.

In the end, you will be silent and watching the gulls float on rising breezes over the bay.

You took my breath away.

And we swore
to kiss
under the stars
and their shadows borne in waves.

I told you
‘this is the certainty from the melancholy’
And I was certain as the waves that I loved.

O- thee and thou and thine
Beloved, beloved of mine
I am thinking, so lately
That this idle form
is but folly and foolhardy
against the tide.

And in torrents of darkness
come thick, come hard
I have made a silhouette of my heart
which was broken up by moonbeams
distant lightning and daydreams
that came in on easterly winds
to make their love.

I have made love in dark places.
And chased, on morning, the whispers
tried to decipher them like a code
I have chanted great verses
like they were holy words.

And
just once a day
on the shore
by the sea

I have been seen
to weep.

Wade out far and weep.

Because
the wind doesn’t chill me
it kisses me and leaves me by.
The sun doesn’t shine
it just kisses
and leaves me by.

So I have sighed
and let the breath of my body go
over the waves
and out, with sea breezes, to blow.

Memorandum;

Oh

bless

this foolish romance

of mine.

Oh

tide

and distant, setting star

bless

this foolish

and selfish

work of my

heart

&

misguided soul.

Oh

nightfall

fold

around me

and sing

in chimes

please, oh please

bless

this romance

of mine.

Mulberry Hooch

(For Joel and Isaac Perkins)

Out on Queen St
under stars that, like sparks in the scrub
seem to cackle
at the
absurdity
of it all.

And I’m hanging my head
like a shaggy dog
from the taxi cab
window.

Cursing the demon drink.

“NAH”
He says to me

“Send you into outer space!”

We sing
Ground control
To Major Tom
But we don’t know the words.

All I can smell is mulberries
I remember being nine
and picking them
on Stradbroke Island
to eat with crab.

I don’t even
like mulberries.

My mouth
tastes
like sin.

Yarr a bloody liar!
And III’lll yet see ya on fire! Ya pants that is!
You’ll wish! You’ll wish

He says to me “You wish ya’d never drunk it”

Says me ‘Whoda thunk it?”

And we yell to pretty girls on the train.

Four and a half years
later.
A lonely
plastic bottle
of the Mulberry Hooch
the rocket fuel
the furniture polish
the drink
unfit for poisoning your enemy,
a single
lonely plastic bottle
remains in my mate’s top drawer.

When his brother turns eighteen
in a year or so
We’ll open it.

One big plunge
into
hard learned wisdom
and
obliterated, ignorant
blissdom
that comes
with growing up
and getting older
far from the night-streets
and Mulberry trees.

Here you find me with my eyes open.
Here is the place where sorrow has spoken.
Here the thunder seal is ever, ever opened.

Here is the great well of human feeling.
Here is the sigh in the gum trees that sounds of longing.
Here is the song the slaves were singing.

Here is the surrendered belongings
Here the shouldered cross.
Here the price of greed.

Here the holocaust.

Here is the place mistakes must be paid for.
Here are the things I have bled and wept for.

Here you find me a naked man.
Here we spat in God’s red face.
Here we took down the devil’s graven face.
Here we swallowed the bitter pill.

Here we huddled in the chill.

Here is the rumbling of industry.
Here the smoke is rising.
Here the war is fought.
Here is the dread face of ARES.

Here are the children of the mother we gave rabies.

Here are the groves on fire.
Here are the spires.
Here we marked the stars.
Here we drove cars.

Here we fought and bled on the stone.
Here is the place I have wandered alone.

Here we have eaten.
Here we have been flogged and beaten.

Here we read the Gospel- it means GOOD NEWS
Here we looked at the moon.
Here is where a man once howled.
Here is where I have lived.

Here are the things freely given.
Here are the places the nails were driven.

Here is the crucible.
Here is the fire.

Here is the name.
Here is the Son.

Here is the place
Here comes the hour.

Here is the storm, the switch and the power.

Here is the man.
Here is the fool.

Here is the tyrant.
Here is the tool.

Here is the world.
Here is the kingdom.
Here it is come.

Here is the hangman.
Now it is done.

Here are the slaves
Here their song sung.
Here is the tale spun.

Here is the silence.
Here its begun.

Here is the fury, the fever, the shadows falling.
Here the lament of the lost time is calling.

Here is the loneliness.

Here are the answers.

Here is the rain.
Here are the ransoms.

Here is the apocalypse

Here is the bridge.

Here is the mile
Here the taken inch.

Here is silence.
Here is silence.
Here is the world of men.

Here is silence
Here as silence

Here I am with silence, the world broken,
the seals open, my eyes open.

Here is silence
And here is its end.

“Everything in it’s time.” Old Saying

~

In time the Christmas cards will be marked with loving script.
In time we will watch a march move down the street and gaze up at proud flags moving in a tattered breeze.

In time the affairs had,
you sordid beast
will be lost among graying newspapers and leaflets fading.

Dry leaves in the letterbox.

In time
the suffering will fade and snuff out in the night
like streetlamps on dawns razor edge.

In time
the applause will be for you

and you will find yourself with your arms around another.

Sitting down
near the park
in the overcast
noon.

Watching couples move.

Linked arms, words said.

Pillowcases on the bed-head.

Below the clocks,
summer dresses in laundry baskets.
Underwear on the line.

In time
jasmine has found a moment to bloom
and through the dull glow of distant city lights,
romance, getting lucky, cleavage shots

a snog on Adelaide Street.

I’m at the station
with my head between my knees.

Second movement
After the cum has been spat into a wet loin
and the juice trickles from it.

After the cigarette stub smolders its last and the final crystal tear falls onto flesh and nothingness.

After the fireworks, the band stopped playing, the surgery successful, the chemotherapy over, the president elected, the game won, the final snore of wakefulness, the last ad before the movie, the corpse in the ground.

After I have finished here
the sadness comes
like a hunter’s moon, like a tomb,
like a runic shield on the chevron of dawn.

The sadness comes like sand in the air
whalesong in the sea,

The sadness sits in like a girl moving in nextdoor,
people in passing,
old bones.

My bones
feel old
like
Virgil
once treat on my ashes
and sat under a Birchwood tree
leaving only scribbled words which relate to long dead heroes.

I wake surrounded by capacitors, circuits and conductors
electric signs and dark streets that go for miles.

Sometimes in the distance
a dog takes up howling
at the moon
who is
his ancestral friend.

I pull myself from the water, dry my hair, put on my glasses and look at the sea.Poet.

The waves say;

“

Yours is the final word or all foolish things left in the world.

To you, is given

Silence and shadows.

Substance and stuff.

And the things, that great men and womenfolk
are made of.”

We leave each other
ancient lovers – a poet and his shore,
the world of time beckons,
the world of wine,
of electricity,
of sex and skin and loafing around,
of lofty aspirations and fading stars.
of death and broken dreams.

Come swiftly,
O words that happen after the final watch extinguishes
the lantern on the street.
Come O darkened embrace
tell me all your secrets.

O steel and sound
and convertible cars.

O hungry eyed leaders of whom much is expected
O wronged and those who wrong-do
Come all, Come too,

And walk a line,
the last line
of defense
that this world has from madness.

Forth and final movement

In time
a hundred thousand words boils down to an atom
in space.

And DEATH
marks my face, our pack sealed by kisses.

O for that taste of honey-coloured sunlight
before the breath gives out.

And we’ll all say O
by each of all the cracked stones.

Moses came down from the mountain and forbade the worship of idols.

I say
bend to whatever breeze
blows you.

But sway
do not be blown
away.

Airy things are so difficult to seek and to find
but in time
everything comes to rest.

The heart in my chest.

Our constant sun and favorite star
the pain behind the scar,

The wound, the wanting,

The taking and the keeping,

This hiding places
our eyes and faces, come to rest, come to rest,
constellations, our faculties and sensations
Shakespeare said ‘sans everything’
and he was right.

In time
the strings are cut from the kites.

And a hundred thousand words is loosed to four winds
by words and songs the sing
for us, about us, like hot air rises,

The songs take us up, like hot air rises,
the music, in time, will rise up
and with it we too, we rise up.

And on morning we are floweth over
life’s great cup.

P.S

Yes,
everything, in its time. BTD 11/12/2008

~

For Milica.

“When I consider how my light is spent
     Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
     And that one talent which is death to hide
     Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
     My true account, lest he returning chide,
     “Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?”
     I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies: “God doth not need
     Either man’s work or his own gifts: who best
     Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed
     And post o’er land and ocean without rest:
     They also serve who only stand and wait.”  John Milton.

“All things considered”

When I consider the run of my hours,
the pass of time, the way I angst over
chimes and chains with balls attached, balls of iron.
And dates and doom. And tome and tomb.

Time spent in and out of sorts,
on and out of love’s course
and the run of the river.

When I think of the time I have spent
half in love, in love with halves,
I have half a mind, to seal myself
away from waking eyes and dreaming thoughts,
breathless, some beast cursed for lack of purer morals.

And I look back on my life and see.

I see young men on the breeze, down near the surf
I see them stand in board shorts and with boards
as waves whip up and crash to shore.
I see a shower and sandy feet.

I see the night streets.
And ghost houses standing, lights out, but shadows behind the window awnings.
And cars moving against the grey morning.

I look on my life and I am having flashes of dreams in waking.

While half drunk on cheap Russo Vermouth
Nothing is at my mouth, but devils.

They speak and are gone.
They listen and are gone.

I look down and gravel is crunching at my feet.
I look down on my life and see it
moving.

Trains leaving every half hour.

Inside them, people in their own business
bathed in the effervescent fluorescent light.
A young couple kissing and cuddling.
An old woman
her face like a dried fruit.

A drunk with a big black beard.
Indian youths on their phones speaking their own language.

Security guards in blue uniforms
school kids in blue uniforms.

I look down at my life
and see my watch is slow by ten minutes
the kettle still warm
off the train and the wind blows up and whispers an ancient riddle
all the stars are laughing and the moon in the first house
is shedding her skin of darkness to show us….

What?
What secret have I found under the gaze of distant suns?

Stolen kisses, in the lamplight, by the sea
with a girl who used rose-apple scented shampoo
and was flirty, but not fond of me.

Sex behind the biggest tree in Musgrave Park

While distant shadows moved in nearby windows
the night getting later, dark coming down as the lights went off
and in the shadows cast her jeans unbuttoned, her shirt pulled up
darkness my armor, darkness my cloak of covetousness.

Darkness, my friend in lonely lust.

What else is the wind born of shadows saying?
Nights of labor
vast, plastic, lifeless Christmas decorations
hung to the smell of sweat
the ache of bodies,
the taste of wine.

An empty stage
the lights go out
silence falls in a second after initial applause
I step out.

I step out of the train.
It’s new years eve, a lesbian on my arm.
Standing in the queue, to the ball
the big one; in City Hall
a plump girl in front of me
grey hairs behind,
a marriage proposal at the stroke.

Morning arise.

All things I consider.
Images beat through my head like wings
Forest – trees as far as I could see; dark, whispering silences, like a wall.
Twilight, the purple sky.

A sea-shore.
And war monuments in the distance.

A town wall, twenty feet high.
Cobbled stones, streets, cathedrals on the skyline.

I look down to my shoes and I remember
the cobbled stone streets, the market square,
the turrets, the towers, the great spires, the dungeons,
but mostly and above all,
the broken stones
in the street.

I prayed last night.
A foolish thing.

I lit candles and tried to chase spiders in my mind
and found they had left plenty of cobwebs
on the old furniture I left unguarded
and dust had formed on photos in places of my memory I left undusted.

I had a dream. Of a ruined city.
And in all the rooms were pictures of people I knew.

Morning arise.
Saturday. I hear every young man have his hangover.
Bottles lay here, bottle lay there,
naked women and poor planning, everywhere
Road-works stretching vast miles,
cranes in the skies.

Signs.

“Save your sex life”

“Plan for the future”

“Channel 9”

In my recycling
papers are crushed and thrown in with the empty bottle of vodka
and two empty bottles of dry
the words emblazoned bold read; change
the words emblazoned bold obscured from gaze
by my last box of tissues.

When I consider
how my tears are shed
I pray
a foolish thing.

My heretic ancestor worship not withstanding.

I saw lately
more pretty girls, their eyes in tears,
talking in hushed, angry, desperate tones,
on their slim line, flip top mobile phones

I saw lately
the human heart, fractured, bloody, still
and it was broken.

Footsteps echo in empty stone halls
and on the night streets.
Where ghost houses stand and whisper their stories one to another.
what is that story? Where is the echo and the reply?

Where is the fury and the vengeance?

Where is the change they spoke of?

Where is the brick in relation to the sun?

Where is the Son in relation to his God?

At a latitude
of one hundred and eighty degrees
south of heaven.

Here
at ten thousand
kilometers away from Eden
I sip the juice of forbidden fruits
look down to my boots and up to see the horizon waving in the distance
off the roves of distant buildings. I see summer in a sweat droplet on the forehead of a pretty woman in a café.

And at midday
ten thousand kilometers from Eden.
The cup runneth to empty
The river runneth over.
The petrol tank is empty.
And it’s not over;
War. Strife. Greed.

This is not what was written
but it is how we are judged.
So where then?

Is the marking place of great thought?

I have no great thoughts
I barely open my mail, I don’t return phone calls.

I’m considering those echoes and calls
angels make past midnight,
things said to bare breasts and sleeping babes.

Today
at ten thousand kilometers away from Eden
I’m back in the café.

Spending my last dollar.

And melancholy, my friend, grabs me by the collar
and says to me;
unloving words and forgetful things.

I probed my mind and found
rust and dust and dreams buried
under concrete and the first winter’s snow.

I tore up the papers and bills.
Made my bed and died to the world.

Choirs sang and priests shouted
a word.

Cars started.
Babies slept.

Their mothers
wept.

Against the stones erect
in forgetfulness.

All things considered?
The taste of wine, of juice
of cheap Russo Vermouth

Perilous times
the doom
awaiting at the end of the tunnel

life ground down to a grain and a kernel.

sifted through the shaking hand of a poet
who says nothing
prays mostly
foolish thing.

The carolers sing
And Christmas lights adorn all the houses

All things are stirring
men and mouses

And my mind
hums, like a dull groan, an engine
left to run all night
till it considers

all things.

Darkness, my song and my last love
Where is the tune? Where is the melody?
Where is the memory?

In what part of the brain did I leave my hope?

When I came around did I leave my keys?

What did I hide behind the locked door?

What’s the score?

What more can I say?

To sun and stone
and sand and star
and distant lights that we gave names.

What did we trade or lose in being here, being now?

When I consider the run of my hours
I think, no more and no less
of everything in its place, a place for everything
but instead, I see what is lost.

All things considered
what is gained?

What did we lose or trade in being here, being now?

Did we laugh and love beyond the time the owl sung his last?

Were we steadfast or has the tyrant won, the world come down
and these houses are our ruins that we, in darkness, cling to?

If  I wanted to kiss would you want to kiss too?

~

‘One or Two good friends’

Fall in love, fall away far, fall away star
fall off the lands-ending, fall away far,
fall to the edge of the world and over its gar
fall over, fall away, fall in love
fall fast.

I’m here, in my toil, in my folly
Caught  up in the sound and the fury
(which signifies nothing)
lost in stress and worry
against forgetful kings and their spiteful quarries
I am here, in the ‘hey nonny nonny’
converting my sounds of woe to a flurry
and flush of hearts.

My only, only one, only one I need,
I’m here
despite all
for thee.

II

Name him forsaken.
Name him misshapen.
Name him unlucky or unloved.
Name him taken.
Name him shaken.
Name him disguised by star above.

Name him liar.
Name him fire.
Name him Son.
Name him No one.

Name him a poet.
Name him versus
Name him Nathanial.
Name him Perseus.

Name him enemy.
Name him ally.
Name him brother.
Name him priest.

Name him laughing.
Name him aftermath
Name him Saturday, barbeque and beer.

Name him fear.
Name him terror.
Name him pleasure.
Name him sympathy.
Name him agony.
Name him apathy.

Name him pathos
Name him, the Grand Final Hopes
Name him great names, great stars, boulevard names.
Name him to fortunes and fames.

Name him
Lionheart
Artur
Kalvipoev

Name him Homer
Sophocles
other Greek poets.

Name him epic
Name him hero.
Name him barrier.
Name him zero.

Name him failure
Name him President.
Name him renter
Name him resident.

Name him Bishop.
Name him Brian.
Name him purchase-hire.

Name him bank card
Name him broken heart.
Name him in the names of the parted roads, the bending trees and a river as still as a dream had at midnight.

Name him.
Quiet.
Name him proud.
Name him nude.
Name him aloud.

Name him lit.
Name him flirt.

Name him
put to his skin
the word
and tell him all you know
about being a man.

III

Instead
she entertains my bad
& overeducated sense of humour.

Instead
we stay up
and watch two movies
on Friday night.

Instead
I try
to salve
her tears when
we have to part once more.

I’m reminded of an old song
and a feeling that is as ancient and as fragile as the human heart itself
love lost
love found, caught, had, and then lost again to the ethers
as melancholy sets in
and a night sea breathes its way onto the beach
to make its timeless love.

And as they part,
the naked and wet shore
reflects to a starlit heaven
inhabited by long dead poets.

As they part
sea & shore
I can hear the distant waves
weep
and
roar.

IV

Out at Byron
on that Eastern point
the lighthouse plays its heavy tune
and shines its light to the eyes of captains and the hope of sailors.

O- Stay away from the rocks.
O- stay away from the rocks.

My love is like that lighthouse
and like the shore.

And I am the storm
raging
over distant islands asleep in their dreaming.

She is
just beaming
and singing
in the language that says
come home, bonnie love,
come home to me, come away, come home.

Come home, bonnie love
I’ll see you when you make landfall.
Come home, bonnie love.
Come home.

The storm comes in
drenches me to the bone
but I am happy.

I smile
and flash a toothy grin
from the shore
to the bay
in the eye of the storm
across the way

I have been made insane.
I have spent time in the asylum
With the melancholics and the violents
And the alchoholics and psychotics
And the obsessive and the neurotics
And I have fallen in love nonetheless.

I have drunk homemade moonshine.
I’ve smoked behind the bushes, near the sport shed, in the school
I’ve spent many years playing the fool
And have fallen in love nonetheless.

I have lived a young man’s life.
Fast cars, loose women and hours spent intoxicated.
I have lied, scammed and faked it.
And have fallen in love nonetheless.

I have rarely held back my opinion
Caused a bit of upset and friction
And have fallen in love nonetheless.

I have had my heart cleaved in two.
I have slept with people who are bad for me.
I have lived hard and swiftly.
And have fallen in love nonetheless.

I have been counted among the ranks of poets.
I have written a thousand lines of mostly trash
I have become a cheap-rhyming hack.
And have fallen in love nonetheless.

I have spoken my words, said my rhymes.
I have looked down to my watch and seen the time.
I have seen New Year’s been and gone.
I have answered the ringing phone.
And fallen in love nonetheless.
Fallen in love nonetheless.

I’ve been there and back again
Grown up and found myself, man,
And fallen in love nonetheless
Fallen in love nonetheless.

VI

As I have got older
I realise
one or two
good friends
is all you need.

If you have
one or two
think of yourself lucky.

As I have got older
I know
everything fades
in time.
Everything fades away.

But one or two
good friends
one or two
make this life
pass
more smoothly.

I used to have a dream
where I had a party
and counted the people absent.

Too long have I been in love with absent friends.
Too many times have I toasted their name.

Now,
I toast those here,
those at my table
under the storm sky
dark and sable
drinking,
laughing,
eating,
loving,
one or two friends
and I’m becoming
one or two bits more than myself and my own heart.

I’m finding in them, my best parts.
These one or two good friends…..

Fin

Racehorses, river-songs and rocket-ships’

A so Spring suite of lines & rhymes by Mr. Brent Downes

I

Makin’ love
‘cause it’s warmer now
the suns up
later hours
shinin’ through
shinin’ down on me & you
makin’ love ‘cause

That’s what we do
after the spring’s warmer winds
have blew.
And brought a bit a sparkle
to our eyes

& a bit o- twinkle to the skies

& as evening flies
we’re makin’ love

In the warmer evenin’

Feelin’, kissin’ & breathin’
in
the smell of skin,
that one owned by one another

Makin’ love
‘Cause it’s warmer.

So then O- cool skin before me
take not heed
and pay you no mind
to the way of my words
& the fall of my rhymes
& never
pine over things I hearsay
but lets love
in other ways.
By twos and by threes
on blankets woven by spring breeze
cool & kissed with warm

O-kissed lips
moving before me

Come into

The days a dawnin’
and the season’s so slowly warmin’
like my affections
and appetites
&
will to kiss upon the hours of late night.

So we’re makin’ love
under the hole in the ozone layer
raisin’ spring hopes
like a prayer
movin’
flirtin’
then some
under distant moon and distant sun,
love on O spring warmed skin
and to me, your honey-song
sing.

II

Here we go again.

So they say, that when you know
You’re in love, the south easter blows.

And that to kiss, on that wind,
Does once more, romance begin.

So here,
Under a clear.

Evening.
I’m believing.

The little myths they tell us,
and not making much fuss.

But to pen it down, as I see it
Just to record, not to decree it.

On spring, its true of this city
That most of the ladies- pretty,

In their frocks of satin and synthetics
Come, in weather, if it permits.

To watch the horses race
to put a little bet on the horse’s race.

So there are they, crowded around a table with umbrella
And by degrees, a few cocky fellas,

Move with intent to the gathering, to test their luck.
Some leaning on their beers, like a crutch.

And some, by degrees
Get kissed on the south easter breeze.

Noon, or thereabouts
Watching the racers, on the roundabouts

And drinking
and thinking.

A beauty leans over the railing
Not in an charms is she failing

But something in her eye speaks of a melancholy soul
And her pallor seems sad, or cold.

So to her, I make my acquaintance

And for her friendship, I seek patronage.

She seemed, at first
Shy, and for drink, the worse.

She proceeded to tell me, by degrees
That her boyfriend had kissed some other on the south easter breeze.

I consoled her
And told her

That it was a most lesser man to discard her so
And I smiled and told her, that such things happen with the south easter blows.

But I invited her, all the same
To share with me her name

And to drink with me, in the pavilion
Where we sat among other civilians

Looking to waste a dollar and a day
Watching the horses line up to race.

A few tears, had she on her cheek
I said, do not weep.

For it is spring
And what ended, now re-begins

And I entreated her, choose a horse
And lend your heart to the races course.

So she gestured, to a white mare

For the race, being prepared.

So to the office, I went, and in her name bid,
Just a few spare quid.

Back to the stands, with more drink to please
The sad, spurned lady I met on the south easter breeze.

The horses lined up and the siren blew
And her white mare shot through

A gap, by the turn
And won by a length, like fire she burned.

So what began as a trifle bet
Won a size of coin for my new friend.

She said she was indebted to me
And I noticed that her sorrow had eased

The lovely spring beauty on the south easter breeze.

So to dinner we went
And many words were said.

Some plain, romantic
All relaxed, nothing frantic

And with the moon, high
I kissed her under evening’s sky

And said, Happy October, Happy Spring,
Be us as Queens and Kings

Be us merry, be us well
And I toasted her health.

And the fortune, that drew us together, by degrees.
Just one so spring day in the south easter breeze.

III

Reading Pushkin, who advised, ‘hold the love that comes in dreams’

The love, never doubted, quite secure,
Often jaded, but always pure.
Left its traces on my morning skin.

Last night, I followed it, to see where it went,
But it stayed in one place, whirling, whirling.

I woke, from a dream I had about a graveyard
And some men singing above the ditches in soft earth
And the words ‘hold the love-

That comes in dreams’

I think instead, to move from dreaming into waking thoughts
and love no others than those who sign there names into my very soul

And still, baring that mark, crave my kisses once more.

IV

From the skin the wound is bleeding
From the wound, the sorrow seeping,
The red sign of a life spent and gone

To darkness, gone, gone!

Away! AWAY! For I will have no light in dark hours
But on terrors that follow me here
I will have no illumination.

I will bare no words! No words bare me!
From the skin that is torn
So shall I torn be!

As babes are torn from their wombs
Into breathing bloody life.

O-bloody life, O breath filled days
And elapsed times where we have been both breathless and bloodless
what refrain will be here sung
in the shadow of cracked, craven monuments,
blistered skins, icy tears and crystal wine glasses.

Come, let us have a toast.
The final guest
has arrived.

V

Mu armastus,

My love

The days are long without you

And with
each passing, empty moment

All the seconds we had
seem fleeting
like kisses that dreams do not remember.

I miss you.

Warm doesn’t seem warm.

Everything
is dull
like
in old pictures.

Everything fades, everything dies.
Except one thing.

And that
is my lips longing for your lips.

VI

Finale.

Company, I keep,

By the river
next to stars and distant planets,
horizons I chase,
flesh I have gripped
and breaking day.

O spring morning
touch
me,
there on my cheek
with the breeze
that burns
like a kiss
and leaves me wanting more.

I watch
the wind stir the leaves of river trees
and make them fall.

I watch
as people link arms
meet each other’s lips.

I watch the rocket ships.
Meet the stars.

And I sail with them
On their winds, in their wake
blazing, the candle burning bright
the heaven that bends above lovers tonight
things I have said and things I might,
Let me make the charm!

Let me make the spell and make the rhyme
And like the rocket-ship, climb
And gaze on breezes and dreamers
and beauty
& sand & star & sea.

And me.

By the river
Singing songs.
makin’ sounds
makin’ love,
doing my rounds,

Doin’ as I do

Loving the spring sky blue
it’s so spring,
so you,
come to the
room where love is made
and things are said,
stories done,
Lovers – it is faerie time, get thee to bed.

Squalls of lorikeets sing and squawk around my head

And its spring, starry skied spring
kissing breezes, spring
The breeze is blowing
the terror in my heart
named ‘love’ is growing.

I bathe in the glowing
of evenings spent
in and out
of love.

In and out of sorts.

Among the words.

Looking for a sign.
Speaking in tongues
and watching the time

Makin’ love

Doin’ fine.

Fin

“Hush at the Moon”

(And other poems)

“Hush at the Moon”

Come back to fallen leaves sparkled with dew,

glinting like broken shards of glass on the night streets.

Come back to the same dark streets
and have the evening close in like vast depths around you.

Come back to the passageways and the back-yards and the front steps.
Come back to the waking place of architects.
Come back to blue eyes and silver change.
Come back to a dollar and an ended day.

Come over to the other side of the road
We’ll stand in the lamplight
In the shadows cast by streetlights
Steal kisses from the shadows in the halflight

and in the moonlight
I’ll make it back
to the other side of evening.

Come back to a whisper.
Come home to a dead man’s house.
Come and read the charges and the set-lists and the bill notices.
Come to the coffee table.
Come back when you’re able.
Summer here is a word on the wind that sounds like
“Soon, my love”
“Swoon, my last,
for my kisses, warm summer will find
and wash in warm rain”

Come back to your doubts.
Come back to the hours
spent in sleep.
Come back to your clocks.
Come back to your rocks.
Come back to the blood around us.
Come back to a sensation and susurrus.

Come back to the coastline.
Come back to your shore.

Come back to a straw broom
and a wood floor.

Come to the thunder.
And to the lightning, come
Come to the river
And through the river-city run,
Run on and shine. O-Glinted evening
Sharply we have spoken
And quickly I have woken
And looked on the time.

It always seems to be running
running out, running away
and I have come to find
day by day
that dreams are the one thing
you can’t get back to.

But come back to my kisses
And I’ll make it back to you
O song of nightfall
O tempered footfall
O beguiled dream of yesteryear we have named
‘romance’.

Come back and dance
through the halls of places the people gather.
Wash your face with rich lather.
And come! For the taxi is here.
And come! For we shan’t want to miss the fireworks.

Come back home.
And wipe your feet on the welcome mat.
Sit out on the porch by evening and watch the bats.
Come back- O warm blankets & warm embrace.
Come Winter we shall be warm.
Come back and be reborn.

Come back
O daggered stare
O foul moods
O poisoned words
O icy disposition.

Come back O infallible wisdom
We’re all sinners in the end.
I’m always the sinner in the end.

And I’ll repent.

Come back
regrets.

Come back
whiskey and cigarettes

Come back heartbreak,
come back rumor and whisper

Come back and remember.

Come back and linger
O talon finger

Come back O fangs and sickly gazes.
Come back and see my disgraces.

Come back fleshy flesh
Drop your disguises and speedily undress.
Come back to bed
Let’s spend the weekend in.
Come and put your skin, on my skin.

Come O-lonely tear
Come O- river muse.

Come and let’s hush at the moon.

“Otherside Road”

Down on Otherside Road
novelists sit
with all their big leather bound books
and typewriters
playing Russian checkers
and writing a hundred thousand words.

On Otherside Road
the bakery is puffing out

that delicious smell
of bread and pastries.

I buy one or two
small things
and eat them
on the footpath of Otherside Road.

On Otherside Road
a café does good business.

On Otherside Road
a few uni students have set up a stall.

On Otherside Road
two young women kiss
and blush as the cars blow their horns.

Down on Otherside Road
in the new apartments

a couple make love on Sunday morning

before their kid wakes up.

A dog barks
at the roaring yellow and blue bus that pulls into the stop with a squeal and hiss
and then pulls away.

It’s morning on Otherside Road
the postman does his rounds
a man pulls up his jeans
a tradesman’s Ute pulls out into the street.
A Mum with two kids in loose fitting school uniforms
one in a stroller
and one in her belly
climbs the whole lot into the four wheel drive
starts the engine
and starts the day.

Evening on Otherside Road
I take a bottle of champagne to the café

And listen to the jazz band play.

Sometimes
Girls in this city
are so bloody pretty.

It’s September
and they’re wearing evening dresses
they’ve dusted off the slinky dresses
the short, silky dresses
with the halter neck tops.

Little flecks of glitter twinkle in the candlelight
and the dull, orange gaslight
they’re jewelry sparkles on the dance floor
and tantalizes me.

I sip
at my glass
of champagne.

The jazz band plays
‘Summertime’
On Otherside Road.

I put my feet up
lean back.

Watch the girls dance and sway
the slinky dresses dance and sway
the twinkling glitter
and silver chains
dance and sway
On Otherside Road.

I buy a vodka lemon
in a highball glass
on Otherside Road.

The taxi cabs drive into Otherside Road.
House-keys make a jingle Otherside Road
The chilly, spring air tingles on Otherside Road
And the city lights shine so bright
not too far from Otherside Road.

And its morning again
on Otherside Road
The bakery is making that delicious smell

The sky above is that pale Queensland blue
and I buy some pastries
just one or two.

And a coffee to go on Otherside Road.
A coffee for my hangover on Otherside Road.
A testament to the last night I had on Otherside Road.

And a hope for what will be next time
On Otherside Road.

“Sexy”

Her black hair
is like the sky
in all the ways that makes me want to jump
from up high.

Her eyes
green
it’s always
been
a weakness of mine.

Her lips
taste like wine
and in so sublime a way
I think it was a night harvest
’cause I can taste the moon
I can taste the darkness
I can hush the moon.

She whispers
her lips to my ear
and we sway to and fro
we move
back and forward
and I hear every word.

She says
‘What a night’
She says

‘What a surprise’
‘What a nice surprise’

To the date
we have had so far.

Her heart
is against my chest.
Her moods are heavy in the lightness

Her lips pouty and serious
when I deny her a kiss.

But leave them waiting.
Always leave them waiting.
Never. Ever. Kiss on the first date.
Always flirt.

She flits
in my dreams.
Of the night
and on evening
in the days to come

I’ll call her
Of course I’ll call her
She’s sexy, Sexy, So damn sexy

I’ll call her

That’s what I’ll do.

His lips
on hers
breathing.

Her nipples
cold
exposed
to the warm breeze.

Her flesh
wet
she’s breathing,
he’s breathing,
they’re breathing together.

He pulled her from the surf
no movie
could write
a meet cute
like that.

So they’re seeing

One another
the knight in the red togs
and the princess
almost drowned
in the surf.

They’re out sharing a few laughs and a few words
and they’re laughing,
breathing,

Their falling,
no,
they’re just being,
being attracted,
a little turned on,
being flirty,
hard to get,
almost got,
not got yet.

They’re breathing in the air of being young
Out and linking arms
being there,
being here,
being fun,
almost one,
not one yet.

She calls him
her savior
and that she owes him
a favor
a debt paid
by a kiss
on the lips.

They’re kissing
breathing,
kissing together,
kissing, breathing, kissing together
breathing together,
kissing as long as they pleasure,
lingering,
making it last,
taking it slow,
not taking it fast.

They’re kissing
being here, being there
being where they are
together.

They’re being together.
They’re together.

She’s breathing, breathing, breathing him in
he’s kissing and being him for her,
she calls him her savior
for breathing kisses and life into her.

He’s breathing kisses and life into her.
Into her, onto her, over her
like warm blankets of morning
in all the coming days,
he’s breathing,
they’re breathing,

They’re kissing
She’s saved.

“Through my window”

(For Misbah – with many thanks)

Through her window she can see
whole spectrums of time and being
whole universes seen and unseen
through her window she can see,

The Cheshire cat grinning
and inviting
all the sinners to a party where the devil is the host
and Proust makes the toast
to his excellent health.
And all the poets there are selling their souls,
selling their souls, shedding their skin, shedding their clothes,
shedding their souls and showing themselves
and selling the souls for a song and a penny.

For a penny, I look out my window
And see smoke rising.
I see distant suns setting.
I see Virgo rising.
I see the world turning,
I see the pages flapping the wind and burning
with the breeze that bruises cheeks of lovers.

For a penny, through my window
I hang my secrets out to dry
Through telescopic lenses I spy
on distant beauties and nearby stars.

Through her window she can see
the days to come
and nights to follow.

Through my window
I can borrow
but a pinch of daybreak
and add it to my mixed up mind
and stormed tossed soul.

She says to me
We can sing of romance tomorrow
We can sing of heartbreak tomorrow.
For now look through the window.
Look through the window.
See what you can see.

Say I ‘The sea
and people moving
and loving on the wind
making plans, making troubles
scraping joy from the sorrow’

Says She ‘Sing of them tomorrow
Sing of all tomorrow

Sing to me tomorrow
But now look through the window
Look through the window

Look through the window
And dream, and dare to dream.’

“Toast”

Let’s all be upstanding for this one!
Ladies and Gents a bit of Hush to the Moon!
A bit of shush in the room!

To you and your muses
And for all the ends and uses
May you never need to justify
Here Here! Here Here!

To you and your beginnings
And mornings
That are breaking
See through the dawn that
shines on, shines over
and kisses us with tomorrow
Here Here! Here Here!

To you lovers
Never miss the lips
Never rush your kiss
And never forget to breathe,
to breathe, always to breathe and to live!
Here Here! Here Here!

To all circumstances that would threaten to knock our blocks off
Here are my words to blow your socks off
Whispered, each to each
And sung for you hear on the edge of daybreak.
To all our troubles and all the messes.
May they be shortened and lessened!
Here Here! Here Here!

To high places
and evening stars
Be long and warm so that we may revel within!
And may work be short so the reveling may begin
Here Here! Here Here!

To Mr. Speaker and the politicians

Try to make some good decisions
that reflect the needs of the people,
never forget your people,
you shouldn’t forget the people
who put you where you are.
Here Here! Here Here!

To the rich-give a little more.
To the poor- hold on a little more.
To the lonely may love come.
To the love may it be as strong as the river run
Here Here! Here Here!

To the moon and all the tides.
To the places inside
where we store the memories of yesterday
and the hope of tomorrow.
To our decisions
and conditions we find ourselves within
To the face above your chin
Lift your glass and whisper this prayer.

May life be long
And Spring winds be fair and strong
And may we all sing that song that
puts the whispers together.
May we link arms
in the arrival area of forever.

May we be and dream and dare to live inside a single moment
May we never be alone in it.

May we stand under the moon and laugh, laugh,
laugh together laugh,
Here Here! Ha HA! Here Here!

Fin.

Fellow literattes, survivors of the fallopian highway and existencial decadence. These are some other words of wit, whimsy and romantic reassurance from one poet breathless under the shadow of midnight.