Along the Way

Along the Way

I’ve lost Ed along the way.

Don too.

And Hobbo, of course.

We’ve all lost him.

Blogging friends come and go

like friends in the real world.

But a handful, a baker’s dozen, if you’re lucky,

stay with you.

Your tribe.
Through thick and thin.

Missteps and triumphs.

Five years is not a long time

but they’re always there

sharing their thoughts, their little poems,

their stories,

knowing you won’t be judgmental.

A few drift off for a while

but they come back.
I love their voices in the night,

on bleak afternoons,

on the mornings you’re home alone,

souls you can share your inner life with.

And they listen

*pic courtesy of dreamstime.com

Death on the Double Decker

We were coming home from the pictures, dad and I —

we had seen one of the great ones: Gary Cooper in ‘High Noon’,

when an announcement came over the bus radio,

that the King had died. Everyone fell silent then as the announcer

proceeded with the details. I never knew the king — I was only a kid —

but later he meant much to me. I wear a silver ring now with his image

on the head for he was a stutterer too. But he overcame it.

Whenever I spoke in public and felt nerves coming on I looked at the face

Of King George VI

Credenza

My parents partied to Mario Lanza.

His records littered the credenza

before ending up on the turntable.

[ it was the era of Clark Gable].

and everyone would their glasses clink

when Mario sang ‘Drink Drink Drink’

He had a big voice and big loves,

and the habits of a tiger cub,

‘impossible’, it was said, to housebreak.

He died too young at thirty eight.

Way way back in ’59.

Then along came Elvis. He was mine !

• pic courtesy of Wikipedia

Parable of the Breathing Tube

“You won’t even know it’s there,” said the surgeon.

          “My brother-in-law sure did,” I replied referring to the incident in the ICU which I witnessed.

          AS he was coming out of his sleep, he became aware of the tube down his throat and began struggling with it so violently that he had to be held down by three nurses while he was put into an induced coma. He stayed that way for three days.

          “You won’t even be aware of it,” the surgeon said, “and if you are you won’t remember.”

          I decided to go with that. In the end you have to put your faith in something.

          Still, some days later as I was wheeled into the operating theatre, the last conscious thought was of that tube down my throat.

          Many hours later as I slowly awoke, I remember the doctor saying, “the breathing tube is out now, you can speak.”

          “What breathing tube?” I asked.

          The thing is, if you don’t know something has happened to you, has it really happened?

Furrow in the Head

I drove past the Snack Bar the other day where twenty years before I came across the boy with the furrow in his head.

He was in his early teens, with a patch over one eye and did not speak. His mate, a little older. spoke for him. They left with a few cans of coke and cigarettes.You could do that in those days.

What happened to him? I asked the shopkeeper after the two had left.

Well, he said, they were out in the shed horsing around with a speargun when it discharged. The spear shot across the room and took off part of the boy’s head.

We both went quiet for a while as the horror sank in.

I purchased my newspaper and left.

Everytime I drive past that shop …..

Stuck in the Moment

Someone once said, be in the moment otherwise you will miss your life.

I don’t know about that.

Once I was stuck in the moment.

It was like being stuck in a lift.

I was going nowhere.

Not even up and down.

There was no way out.

No alarm button to press.

No side passages to explore like in a labyrinth.

I was stuck. In the moment.

That moment when at three in the morning

the phone shrieked at us

from the hallway.

I could hear the old Minotaur lurching down the tunnels

of my brain.

I tried not to panic.

Tried smoking a cigarette

Humming a tune

Studying a fly on the wall

Studying me

Reciting my nine times tables

the alphabet back to front —

do you know how difficult that is? —

And then suddenly SNAP

I was out of it.

I don’t know how long I was in the moment.

But I did wonder if I’d ever

Get out and join

The flow of life again.

Three Nights

Three nights of frazzled sleep

crammed into four hours on the couch

mellowed by malbec, merlot, mataro

an afternoon of tasting platters & wine samplings

at Penny’s Hill where black-faced sheep slumbered

under the oak; now you slumber so gently:

sweet Lethe has taken your troubles over the border;

you will awaken and forget

Immaculate Misconception

That photo you posted

on Facebook

of her and him

unmoored me

sent my head spinning

down

down

that whirlpool

of memory

the immaculate misconception

of my frail craft

the face in the photo

having the last laugh

Macabre Memory: Warning

The cat left no suicide note

unlike the farmer who died

in the same way

head swathed in cling wrap

like a cellophane mummy

note fabricated:

he met with foul play.

His wife the killer — Insurance —

eager for a big pay.

But who would asphyxiate a cat

& dump it by the riverside

where dreamy poets wander

& children play?

.

Evie

People walking up and down ,

walking off their sore heads from the night before,

mothers with their daughters, mothers with no one,

people locked on their mobiles,

missing the jaunty waves,

the graffiti of gull talk

and that gorgeous fluffy white spitz from McLaren Vale walking his owner

what’s his name? I ask.

Her, he corrects me. Evie.

Ahh I say after the song.

That’s right, he says. Evie, Parts 1,2 and 3.

And we give each other the thumbs up —

not many people know that —

& could start reminiscing when we saw Little Stevie & the Easybeats

but Evie is keen to get moving

just like Little Stevie who couldn’t keep still;

And above us, because

there’s a strong breeze,

there’s wind surfers flying around

like a dazzle of butterflies,