#2364 -- as page is my canvas

 

2364

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21.vi.26

as page is my canvas

 

let day be spread

 

I have a fence of words here

 

let light to purpose fall

 

writing into the blank

 

all at pace

 

if catch my drift

 

listen for the singing

 

so write out a list

patch out

 

all corners bright

 

as sky’s my blue

I set to sea

 

as far abroad as

wave me off

 

I’ll make an ocean of this mind

 

let lines meet

 

picture it!

just as I’ve thought

 

signed before a word is said

 

the blank’s just where we are

 

how would you describe your trap?

how do you like it there?

give it a name?  could you?

 

I keep a window open

 

so many sheets all aflutter

 

join these dots

a what’s for

 

dash about like a mad thing

 

come from nothing

back soon too

 

is it like that for you?

#2363 -- we are all lit

 

2363

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20.vi.26

we are all lit

Rousseau ekkie

we are all lit 

even snout to the ground

 

here to be

so singing

with without the words

 

it’s as ever

must have been before

 

even dark of dream we are

 

sap runs a little ladder up

 

imagine the first eye

and the first sky

 

before we ever took a step

 

a jungle tamed the heart

#2362 -- sitting for the dark

 

2362

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19.vi.26

sitting for the dark

ekphrastic for Daniel Boyd’s 2016 ‘ (FS) untitled’

 

a face is from seeing

hands have held

 

in a thicket

last of it

 

there is time

and no time passed

 

we’re gone

they are here

 

now listen!

 

seed and leaf and twig

 

sitting in the dark for the dark

only a moon to show 

#2361 -- a tree grows into a church

 

2361

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18.vi.26

a tree grows into a church

ekphrastic for Roy Kennedy’s 1999 ‘untitled’ –

Police Paddock Mission, Darlington Point

 

a tree grows into a church

grows out of a tree

grows clear through my head

grows a cloud

 

house crooked as our road

and so chimney only wisp

 

a winch for what?

 

the mulberry brainwash

 

commit the paint to memory

 

this is all against the rules

#2360 - it's on the spot

 

2360

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17.vi.26

it’s on the spot

ekphrastic for Georgia Szmerling’s 2026 ‘reflection of pond with nature’

 

pretending stillness

called to hours

 

how a sky blooms

all to a frame of rain

 

one cannot call the colours

but here’s a beak, an eye

 

and the creatures

come grief upon rise

 

we are all hiding

you won’t find any of us now

 

you won’t find anything here 

#2359 -- a quiet desperation

 

2359

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16.vi.26

a quiet desperation

ekphrastic for Fred McCubbin’s 1896 ‘on the wallaby track’

 

ticks, snakes, spiders

just for a start

expect sun to burn

tent to leak

the natives

no, they’re taken care of

 

why, and what were you thinking

 

here’s a little shade away from the tent

little languish

belt holding up the pants for now

 

the grass like rust, a gnarl of trunk

nothing yet a stump

axe holds down the wind

 

gather twig bent to the billy

 

do you think it floods here?

 

summer’s coming

it gets away

 

the child is showing how half a chance

we’d all crawl off

this one’s a biter

 

the wallabies have fled

everything’s ready for settlement

 

nothing will ever grow straight here

soon this will all be fire

#2358 -- set afloat

 

2358

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15.vi.26

set afloat

ekphrastic for Lorna Robertson’s 2023 ‘Love and loneliness of a young mother’

 

mannequin pale gone faceless

at least here are some lips

why corsetly

smudge wove bent

there’s the cloud of coiffure

 

a dripstreak stocking trim

 

it’s cheering to be so outgazed

to measure silence

let lines run

 

elsewhere must appear

 

it’s only the shoes point on