*
I'm leaning on each hour
and now the hours get darker
have to finish up the loose ends I can
so I can travel
meetings in Melbourne
meetings in Hobart
all the decisions of packing
unable to predict Melbourne weather
and to breath the Tasmanian air
after all these years
away stuff
the aeroplane's welded tears
and the fat moon's goodbye
eye from sky-blacked north
twang with interrupted solos
a chorus gathered out of tarmacs
and linked diagrams
inflatable lifejackets
pointed out as necklaces
while the cabin manages
its own politesse
*
in interviews you're adding up
clauses, requirements
you must exclude
the setting in this autumn
an avenue of leaves
above voucher kiosks
veneered history, niches
the ice is coming no doubt
tho' every year it gets later
the letters after your name
recall the arcane
you need an inswing
to be plumb but light
trembles with resemblance
A poem containing Melbourne weather
Faces in the street are coming for me
down the dusk grids of the city
under day's wandering light - ugly, lovely
depends on your own arc
how your skin attaches or repels
the raid on the eternal which is another
idea born of clouds and a whisk of stars.
Or here in the hum of a hotel room
in sight of spires and towers just above
what is now so apparent, readily available
but hard to distinguish where it belongs
on this table, in this work, through this radio.
The surprise is the blue above the squall
a shining through the other or the outer
patchworks like love or beauty unexpected
though not completely how it is you could
keep on pretending division belongs
not even in the sky an enhanced reality
besides which the grey gets grey
and makes sense to crowds floating
but also held to the way that keeps them
if they cannot know even the spires
that routinely mass above them.
The cycle is less massive than hum-drum
than desperate necessity somewhere
between blood and movement
some ante-vision as light cries down
and rain laughs its way past afternoon
wheels knocking out cloud echoes.
- Melbourne, April 2004
*
Interpreting taxis
streets are blacker here
they fall gracefully
past showers of waiting souls
aligned with venues
clouded by programs of laughter
as if there were too many of them
to count
there's something pitched in them
like need
but less certain
set with certain hours
before events before
numbers outside
where the real thing happens
without cause almost
spread
perhaps this too is unfortunate
but there's no way to figure
how full a taxi might be
they display uncertain lights
the street trembles constantly
with tramways
then empties
- Melbourne, April 2004
1980s decor
there's smoke grain in the walls
wheels turning outside
showers and trickles on other floors
a solo piano, fusty, semi-idle
on the airwaves
a famous Wagnerian tenor
some residual pain in my knee
I'm surrounded by mirrors
lessons of light
that somehow there's a side
to me not seen
apart from the fox
at the bevelled edge
- Hobart, April 2004
Walking to water
It's a town of accelerations
and hills
like my town that falls
on its harbour
places where I've walked happy
kicking air and invisible mists
over water
so I walk out like myself
making do with days
that come out of nowhere
memory
making this corner
this chance, this dash
of light that cuts up
stone shadow or
soft dark edges
people to sell you -
also making - something
sweet or heavy
in the hand - a bowl
a taste of rough paper
still a beginner here
I'm unknown and hardly
first fashion
at least let that
become me
dress me up like winter sun
that's a little lighter
down here nearer the pole
where something -
nearly, almost? -
essential is the river
and open-mouthed young
girls dressed for church
or meeting call out to
Billy who's shouting
testing sound at odds
with echoes, broader
fuller than Sunday's street
which has a lazy skim
even as the way
is made busy
in the longer gaps
- Hobart, April 3004
*
the invisible city is always with you
the way you know its inside dream
while the unknown city with its clashing
its sirens and bells
and strange rain charms
transverses your map
and in its latitude confuses
all your directions
every way is underground
stretching
ripple and fold of Australia
worn vastness
smell the heat of Singapore
fuel and tar
*
travel is more walking
looking for signs
interpretation - wrong
a lot of stairs
that could go nowhere
depending
.
climbing into night
its metallic creak
expanse, its different heights
clouds below
unknowing
*
city crowds
their own ways
Prague's, the bridge
where you learn to be safe
with sore calves
*
lit
pre-evening city
unknown birds in the hill park
*
a bee drinks turn by turn
from weed flowers
among Hebrew stones
small yellow petals
from the elms above
in a line across the top
of gravestones
small pebbles and coins
'salut' says one
another - 'I wish for children'
list for a visit
three crested pigeons
a butcher bird
a magpie
many noisy mynahs diving aggressively
two rosellas and their squabble tone
the hovering hawk's wing-tip twitch
a galah in the bird-bath
nine horses in the paddock under the trees
peewee on a horse's back
another twitch
crane and ducks on the dam
two cockatiels screeching
currawongs liquid song
three people and a little black dog crossing the paddock
buzz of a small plane
a rabbit running a gutter in the evening
possum blinking in the nightlight
...
the sad land song
they fly over the spike
grass and the muddied
snake, creek snake
death snake, money
venom
everything but rain
'east of the sun, west of the moon'
we're far up at windows
in a city flashed
with new year stars
lion dance bristles
tracking the asphalt
white and gold verticals
colonial spires
another year's breath
heats the dry season
and its cocktail vocal
press into dark
nodes and expression
'how insensitive'
air labours to be cold
candles refresh the river
fire cracker thousands
it's a family thing
in a way station of strangers
caught between straits
bow over the card
and the god money
gong xi fa cai
Singapore, 9 February 2005
walking - ruby takes to the street
walking with a headache into air
potent with rain, grey with water
the sky and too much attention needed
for bottle brush, wisteria
siamese at a window
each step past all other need
and game, the rain down
my right side - temple to ear
brow to cheek
somehow is undoing me
between gutters and crossings
the four island girls
taking all the path
threads unwinding before me
visions waves as it sees me
going between crowded conversations
past election posters, oil, legumes
taffeta, sacks of rice
looking for the temple of coffee
sitting in a cool corridor
under sky-dropped noise
beside road fuel and daily racket
seized with news
and comment the same, all
the same
in the test of minutes
before the way again
foot for foot
in walking language
back into the valley and sky.
Seacliff viewed from the road
Old hospital hidden
within barred windows
below the trees air thins
sea moans
dark green leaving
and ghosts
who died by fire
electricity, scalpel and the strap
No more screaming
birds leave the land
There’s the gate
there’s a sign ‘no sightseers’
What would you see
a backpackers called The Asylum
To bed amongst
takes more
than I could lean on the gate
thinking of the years
they held Janet down
The hums of motels
So everything sounds like rain
or the palm wind off Timor or Arafura.
You stop the triune blades white
step into the air-con's tune.
Everything falls from the ceiling
even fluoro runs down the wall.
It's as far from heaven as you can get
amongst the humid hip-hop air
up hauling concrete steps.
There's smoke and gasp somewhere.
You've seen this movie
what infernos! you're on the run!
But there's nothing to chase you down
no bulldust, no crocs, leaping lizards
only the phones and the voices
you've made back home.
Like the fortune cookie said:
'you dial it up', now deal the circle
that rain washes away.
You can dust up again tomorrow.
Night's hums are mechanical, electric
while brother rain wets the seconds
and sister storm sings, not little tune
a bigger pattern, atmosphere deep
past beige blue curtains and the sweat.
It's animate, breath and thunder.
Let sleep decide!
At least the walls are white
and the wrapper says 'clean glass'.
Asti Motel, Darwin, 'round midnight, 13 April 2005
stewart island cemetery
to sharpen green wakes, to register
duration, traces that carve poetry
lichen on wood, cemetery
the forgotten, exposed to sun