The way
those branches
stretch
reach out
to
the sky
their heads
of hair
bobbing
in the
breeze;
like we
should be:
reaching up,
out
yet
tethered
like trees
Reach
poem
Biros
I started to think about biros again, how mine was long and thin like a matchstick but it had no heft.
A biro should have heft if it is to write anything of import.
Mine is fine for writing light verse, things of flippancy and quirk.
But for something darker, more adventurous, a biro with girth is required.
Yes, I decided, for Father’s Day I’m going to request a biro with a stubby stem, a bit like its inventor Lazlo Biro
photo of Lazlo Biro courtesy of Wikipedia
Baptism
When you were gone
when it finally sank in
you had left
for good
it was too late
to make amends.
I wept
& shook
that long night —
& was cleansed.
They’ve Taken Way the Steps
They’ve taken away the steps
the ones leading to the first floor
where JB HiFi is
cordoned off ‘coz of covid
the ones I climbed for practice
in case I made The Great Wall
but there are other steps
to keep in mind
that Stairway To Heaven
for instance
the one we all have to climb
to get to our Heavenly home
but if the climb takes as long
as the eight minutes of the song
we all might be in a spot of bother;
hopefully St. Peter has a rescue brigade
of angels on call
or a St, Bernard or two with a small barrel
of whisky around their necks
for those who didn’t practice often enough
on Earth
Certificate
I’m hunting for my birth certificate
once again
to prove that I exist.
They seem to need convincing.
Isn’t it obvious? I ask
but obviously it isn’t.
They need that slip of paper.
In fact they insist upon it.
Doubting Thomases! I think
almost inviting them to touch me.
But I hold back
almost afraid to touch myself.
What if ….?
Perhaps I’ve gone around kidding myself
all these years.
Yes, I think, that slip of paper would help.
I hunt for it furiously.
If only to convince myself.
Caravaggio's 'The Incredulity of St, Thomas' courtesy of Wikipedia
Spent
Now it is spent and lying limp
and placid at my feet —
a contentment of inky blue
but the other day if you
could have seen it bucking
with energy , flailing its
wild hair and arching its back
[ sea mountains surfers abseiled
down ] you would not have been
surprised to see it thrust
its loins again and again against
the soft white dunes nor after
to see the body of the foreshore
bruised and torn nor its rump
so foam wracked .
pic by Lachlan-Ross on Pexels
Meg
Something is bothering
this silkie
She wanders
round and round
the yard
in
a solipsistic fluff
driving us round the bend.
She worries the others.
A few days later
when we let her out she resumes
her circling
then huddles beneath
the bird bath
and will not move.
We shift her.
She crawls under a bush
hard to reach.
The cat who often bothers the chooks
leaves her alone.
That night it rains and rains.
In the morning
she is bedraggled
and dead.
I lift her into the earth.
There isn’t much of her.
The chooks settle after that.
So do we.
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?
.
Bad Company
How’s your girlfriend going? she asks tonelessly..
Pam? Yeh, she’s okay, I say.
You seem to need somebody, she says. A wife, partner, a female friend.
And you don’t?
No. I must be stronger, she conjectures in her haughty voice. I can live with myself. I don’t need anyone.
Loneliness is a morose companion, I add.
She says nothing.
pic by Joey Monsoon courtesy of Pinterest
Three Men in a Cage
Slavering..
Snivelling.
Sneaky.
Three naked men in a cage
in an Edward Steed sketch,
the Jonathan Swift of cartoonists.
Husbands for girls to choose from.
Hobson’s Choice.
pic courtesy of Pinterest by Edward Steed from The New Yorker
