Dirt A group of workmen sit on the street staring up at the slate being thrown from the rooftop. They fly in, they’re the flying kind, they like to group together on the floor. I write a shopping list while I wait for my student to arrive, snake a long line up the margin. The…
There is a crowdsmall but growinglooking out to sea despite the stormI walk overcollar up, head down people pointsome are shoutingothers look away I follow the fingerssee nothing but the waveswild and heaving a man, talking on the phoneruns his fingersthrough his hair I look againout to seanothing, nothing somethinga piece of wooda strip of…
the dark park rankles with hoariness ancient pockets of omnipotence watch youclamber through the gates of treeswith fresh regret & equal determination the cruising spot tinkles with lightas you approach the weathered forms gatheredconstellations of eyes glow before you‘be not afraid,’ rumbles forth as you get on your knees the blasphemy of your body becomes sacredas…
On the wall, photos of when I was a boy, a postcard from Greece, a calendar.Mum tells me she is happy, then turnsaway. Rain falls heavy. When Medea killed her two sons,she knew what she was doing.Mum has read a lot of books, butI don’t think she’s read Medea, or knows that an earlier version of…
Tagging I caught monarch butterflies in my net.Then carefully held open their wings and folded a small white sticker overthe leading edge. I’d written JB on it. I’d wanted to put more—an address,a date—but that was all that would fit. It didn’t seem to affect the butterflies.Released, they flapped erratically away over backyard science and…
Starting the morning at St Kilda Green brown scumon the chevron sandthreading the edgeof the waves I hope it’s decomposing kelpand not the wastewater housedown the coastI swim anywayand never google itwhen I get home My friend tells me about surfingoff the left end of Smailsand getting an ear infection Pipes sputter into the harbourslick…
like flowers: like the soft wet mouth of a bloom: like a noxious weedweeping onion spit into your hand: like an overgrown puffball screaming outits last, sad, spore-filled breath: like a cat clamping down on blue-greentail feathers: a stoat feasting on the delicate orange of a native egg: yolk spilling outall over its fur: congealing: like a fly bloated with…
Physically whimpering, shaking-it-off then turning away to cover your eyes. A bear-dog stillrag-dolls a scrappy puppy-bitch in its dribbling jaws. Reacting late, I cried ‘don’t look,’ shepherding you down a roughly-cobbled lane, in a re-sampled version of a Chinese town to a bar where someone played Muse’s live version ofNina’s Simone’s ‘Feeling Good’. Although not…
It’s an up-risingIt’s a down-fallingIt’s layers and layers and layers Of soilOf concreteOf pain and lossOf searching and wonderingOf saying ‘this is our tūrangawaewae’Of blank stares, of disbelief, of eye rolls,‘ka pai, that’s what you say’ It’s not so much what I sayIt’s what isIt’s what we’ve knownIt’s what we knowIt’s the revelations that keep…
Journaling is an act of autoerotic eviscerationSpilling my guts for my own pleasureAnd stamping around in the juices like a toddler in a puddleMy promethean navel barely heals by the morningIt weeps serous fluid and soaks my sheetsMeaning I always wake up to a damp shirt and pants The first time I slept with my…