thirty years! The Naming of the Harbour and the Trees!

 

#730 - hide under a rock

 

1.i.22

730

3.1

hide under a rock

omikron panic

 

and in the after-ping

how fearfully a year begins

stay home save lives again

 

possum gods at the raised tomato

disguise myself in stormpaint

then the bug can’t catch

 

and other superstitions

I put on just for show

cross the line from nothing to more

 

we’re hiding under a rock here

happy happy, damp at times

a head out shines the kickstart sun

 

how full of the past we are!

topping all the graphs today

off the panic scale

 

take my biscuit jollies

roam the acres

get back under

 

what wars?

what plagues?

what pestilence?

 

you’d think when a year was over …

but no one talks about anything else

set weather catastrophic

 

for whom this turn round time relents

cross an arbitrary

we’re actually under a smooth stone now

 

inscribed with the breathless next words

ache, cough, must suspect

then breakfast

 

gods were born today

it’s day one in the big blank book

still, a garden travels on

 

as if in season

there is occasional poetry

we’re getting ancient here

 

a tissue a tissue

apocrypha too

under the rock

 

deeps of a well

and swim back up to flower

see how we’re making light?

esperanta serio #154 - la pajlhundo

 

154

la pajlhundo

 

estas mia fidela kunulo

iras kun mi kien ajn ion ajn mi pensas

bojas pro miaj imagoj

alportas la bastardhundoj al la rando

                      de konfeso

sed ili forglitas

vosto inter krurojn

ili mem havas nenion por diri

sed

mi pensas, ke vi scias

kion mi celas

 

 

 

the straw dog

 

is my faithful companion

goes with me wherever whatever I think

barks at my imaginings

brings the mongrels to the brink

                      of confession

but they slink away

tail between legs

they themselves have nothing to say

but

I think you know

what I mean

 

 

and today ...

and today is the last day of my three grant from the Australia Council 

for the writing of ataraxia

... an opus that may always be under construction

...

look on these works, ye mighty, and despair 

so long, and thanks for the fish 

#729 - three little poems to round out the year

 

31.xii.21

729

2.365

three little poems

none of which really work

 

 

in ours the empty air

 

word no one owns up

 

wrestle antennae

a lit whiff winter was

 

fine photons fell

pasticherie with luck

 

often I feel I could see further

were we to look under all

 

then distance is a kind of glue

as far as wherever we are

 

always a line underneath

 

 

 

 

bung dream

 

never starts off but you’re there

must have got the wrong end of the stick

 

I was in the wrong job

on the wrong day

at the wrong thing, moment

 

late!

wrong school, wrong class

 

got on the wrong train to not get there

it was the wrong station, wrong platform

I was in the wrong carriage

barking up

backed the wrong horse there, went    

 

had to go back because I was wearing thongs

and you can’t

would never have known if I hadn’t looked down

 

say widdershins

say counterclock

you can see how it all goes wrong

 

must have been a year’s wrong end

my wrong way face

misunderstood

 

I could remember coming out

but now I can’t find the key to the building

yours, not mine

first I find the wrong one

that’s convincing

someone lets me in

always kindness

 

but it’s the wrong place

the carpet tells me inside

and where’s the door?

 

that’s where I wake up in a pandemic

sick as a dog we are were will be

 

this has to be the wrong world

a sun is shining now

 

 

 

 

 

the year runs out

 

it’s just the one day

only one more

come on … you can

it’s less than a sleep to go

 

that’s what they’re saying

every clock’s egging

but we can’t go on like this

there’s nothing more in the tank

 

I kept the doors and windows open

that’s how breezed through

could say survived

 

and now the new year

is just footsteps away

and what a location!

 

so suck out the juice

squeeze the last drips

lick

cut the tube

and fingerscoop

make a cleansweep

 

no one would wish such a year on the world

but it looks like we’re most of us up for another

 

now it’s the 9 o’clock fireworks for me

I mean on the telly of course

tuck up and sleep the year out

 

as I live and breathe

 

esperanta serio #153 - ĉiam

 

153

ĉiam

 

neniam diru ĉiam

nenio estas kiel tio

 

iu ajn uzas la vorton

iam devis engluti iom da dogmaĉo

 

gutas krano

ĝis la tanko estas seka

 

nenio estis

ekde antaŭ komenciĝo

 

salutu vin mem

ŝajnigi

 

sekuru la ĉiameco kontraŭ ŝtelo se konvenas

sed tio ne ŝanĝos la fakton

 

eterneco ofendos la mortintojn

(flagoj polvo kaj triboj longe enterigitaj)

 

mi estas mia propra horizonto

nin englutas stelo

 

kaj jen la vero

konatiĝas kun vortoj

 

de lingvo delonge malaperinta

kiel ĉiu amo

 

sennoma nun la antaŭe

kies atomoj ni ĉiuj estas

 

eterneco estas nebulo de pensado

kvazaŭ koloro estus rapida

 

kvazaŭ unu vorto por ĉiuj

la fajro en la libro en la koro

 

ĉio disvastiĝas

baldaŭ lumo ne atingos nin aŭ iun ajn

 

neniu estis ĉiam ĉi tie

neniu iam estos ĉiam

 

iu rifuĝinto diros al vi

la ĉiamo estas dezira vorto

 

iu ajn celas eternecon

devas ŝerci sin mem

 

neniam diru neniam

nek nek eterne

 

vojoj ne finiĝas

ili elĉerpiĝas

 

ĉio kuras for

 

 

 

always

 

never say always

nothing is

 

anyone uses the word

has to have swallowed some poxy doxa

 

tap drips

till the tank is dry

 

nothing was

since before beginning

 

salute yourself

on cue, pretend

 

hedge it from a theft if suits  

that won’t change the fact

 

forever will offend the dead

flags dust and tribes long buried

 

I am my own horizon

we are swallowed by a star

 

and here’s the truth

acquaints itself with words

 

of a language long gone

like every love

 

nameless now the one before

whose atoms we all are

 

forever is fog of thinking

as if a colour were fast

 

as if one word for all

the fire in the book in the heart

 

the all is expanding

soon light won’t reach us or any

 

no one was always here

no one will ever be

 

any refugee will tell you

always is a wishful word

 

anyone aims at eternity

has to be kidding themselves

 

never say never

nor either forever

 

roads don’t end

they run out