transit (2008)

for Dorothy

how can you say goodbye to all
your kindred at once? sometimes
the emotion must be sung, be
sounded darkly. this time it is
someone in proximity, another
glass broken, one in whose clear
chamber you held this liquid to
the light, as if answers could be
held that way. her words must
keep moving, tongue of fire, will
not pause for you, lick of the blade –

sinewave (2009)

The tomb within the green rise of earth
is the pregnant belly of the goddess,
where the newly dead are sown
to be born back to the sun.


Note: This poem was partly inspired by John Grigsby's book 'Beowulf and Grendel', and samples some words from it.

Coming soon: otoliths 12

Some more publication news just in: Mark Young will be publishing two of my things (some prose vignettes entitled Seven Concentrations, and a short poem called faulty) in issue 12 of otoliths, which for my money is one of the web's premier experimental text/art journals, featuring poetry, vispo, prose, visuals and other forms of madness.

I also had a couple of poems featured in issue 9. Thanks to Mark for finding room for my work.

The Cartier Street Review

Just received word from Bernard Alain that three of my poems (I will not carry, Mid-city meditation and For Edwin) will feature in the next edition of The Cartier Street Review.

I recommend checking out the poems and articles in the journal's archives - there's some great stuff.

haiku (2009)

the morning after:
half-finished tumbler of scotch,
a moth floating dead

formulation

"If any human activity is sacred it is the formulation of thought in clear speech." - attributed to Ezra Pound in Noel Stock's The Life of Ezra Pound.

Below: Ezra Pound by Wyndham Lewis.

coastal (2009)

"too hot to get busy anyway"

unused sky bestowing confidence

we'll take the coastal road

Aussie flags hoisted on roofs, in sandy gardens

'fuck off we're full' sticker
__________________on a ute's rear panel

but let the sunset beach do the tender talking

the brewery will do the rest

the sea:
______yet more fields to be farmed

parasails sweep, flip
______________as tankers ride the horizon


- on the coastal road to Fremantle, WA

development (2009)

impermeable, unstirred, unmoved

these lives that go on regardless

city of satellites

another new suburb on the city fringe

mounds of sand, industrial supplies stand waiting

shopping village has the works for home and garden

"we'll need at least 15 bags of ice"

the hells these cuts of meat came through (you'd weep & refuse to eat)

driving past these oversize words that say nothing, nothing to stop us

"what lifting the ban on uranium mining would do for this state"

news item portraying protesters as terrorist-clown-mutants

this station plays the golden oldies


- Ellenbrook, WA, 1/1/09


Below: 'Au$$ie Living' (click on image to enlarge)