you
sitting all the way
over there

me sitting all the way
over here

inbetween us
a tabletop lake
of frosted silence

all that remains
the question

who will go
ice skating
first

outside the window
the wind keens and roars

all the frustrations
of the world settle
within that voice,

and as it beats it's formless hands
against the the side of the house
and rattles the eaves...

small whispers of ice
sneak inside, under doors
and sigh into our bones

leaving  chills along our spines
and raising the skin in a morse
code message of  loss and sorrow

soon it will pass us over
to seek those who lack
this simple protection
and then, will share  it's misery
with a sad, sadistic joy

tiny bird thief, that cheeky sparrow
lionheart in brown tweed plumage as he
steals  breakfast from the cat's bowl

the cat looks on confused
dinner (he only wishes) stealing breakfast
what a topsy turvy world
must go contemplate this,
conundrum  in the sun patch, by the window

so very large,
is the love,
in my heart.
as i look back,
across the years.

to the people,
who have touched
my being
and shared my fears.

all those days,
spent in a haze of  
laughter, life
and  tears.

all those friends,
found and lost in,
so many, different ways.

you all,
had a part in
shaping these,
my betterdays

it is only now as i write
these words.
i think how,
magnanimous,
you were, to care at all..

each and every one,
could have passed me by....
found a better friend,
merely said,
hello and goodbye.

but i am so,
utterly blessed.
that,
your heart,
saw my heart.

and we gave,
each other a chance,
to grow and fly.

some, just for a season,
some, forevermore.
all, sown into my being
all part of my very core.

and yet, there is still
time and space for more....

the currency of
grieving is in....

casseroles and soups,
left with notes,
on the back doorstep

flowers, bright, beautiful
and fragant,
delivered by gangling, teenage boys.

awkard silences and cups
of lukewarm tea.
mumbled condolences and
too tight hugs

late night rememberances,
after,
far too many drinks

tears, laughter and
in-house jokes...
photos, stories and 
space for quiet reflection.

these things are...
the dollars and cents
of  grief for a friend

but when all is, said
and done....

i would much prefer
to be penniless,
begging on the street,
with pockets empty
and moths for friends.

unwinding the dross
from my mind
makes things no clearer
but at least i see
the rapids before me

unpicking the stitches
from my heart,
makes it no less painful
but at least it lets
the infection out

taking the rocks
from my backpack
does make it lighter
but leaves me frozen, staring
at the signposts of my life

and how do i
get rid of the
etchings of you
off my bones
the tattoo of
your love inked
into my soul

how do i change
my essence
forever
mixed
with yours

it would be just
as easy to
paint the sky green

the urge to question
impossiblities
comes strongly to me
now...

i stare into the water glass
wondering how the water
feels about it's temporary
confinment....

i wonder what cats dream
about....and if they think us sane....

i wonder in the male praying
mantis goes willingly, or unknowingly, to his orgiastic
death.

i wonder why i spend time
wondering why.

i wonder whether the fountain head anticipates
the freedom of the see...

i wonder if the echinda's rattling spines keep with
awake when trying to nap.

i wonder why, you chose me.....

tree
green
       knotty
      gnarled
               limbs
                      bark
                           rough
                           roots
                                  twigs
                   ­                 wood
                                          o­xygen
                        carbon-dioxide
                    ­                           xylem
                                                    leaf
  ­                                                        flower
  ­                                                                 ­  rings
                                                           ­                  seeds
                                                           ­                      earth
                                                           ­                              habitat
                                                         ­                                            timber
                                                          ­                                                  bole
          ­                                                                 ­                                 borers
                                                                ­                                                       sap
                                                             ­                                                          soil
                                                            ­                                                                 life
                                                            ­                                                                 ­    earth
                                                           ­                                                                 ­           trees
                                                           ­                                                                 ­         forrest
                                                         ­                                                                 ­             green
                                                           ­                                                                 ­              red
                                               ­                                                                 ­                 orange
                                                          ­                                                                 ­ autumnal
                                                       ­                                                                 ­                     livid
                                                           ­                                                                 ­            living
                                              ­                                                                 ­                     growing
                                    ­                                                                 ­                                      worlds

i love you,
fresh from
the shower.
glistening and wet,
smelling of aftershave.
"coolwater" by davidoff.  often aslo sandlewood,
goat soap, from the local
farmers markets.

i love you,
dressed up smart.
in a brook's brother's way
dress pants and shirt,
blue linen vest.
johnny walker silk bow tie,
untied is best. then your twist,
(not as original as you think)
converse skaties, no socks
and  bone bleached cuffs,
turned up.

i love you,
in your work gear.
just come home,
you smell of sweat.  
clean and healthy,
always wood shavings
caught up, in your
unruly shaggy hair.
cargo shorts and
t-shirts,
that have seen,
many days of worksite wear.
size elevens in your hands,
those big feet and freaky toes
bare, ******* in the air.

i love you,
in board shorts and rashie.
rushing into the surf,
hand in hand.
with the energetic bundle
of love,
to which we gave birth.

it is not as though,
clothes made this man,
but boyohboy, you, frame them well.

it s the heart, the chuckle
the hands, the philosphy,
the clever, erudite, caveman,
the downright,
man-dumb bloke.
that endears, your heart to
mine.

it is, that you really listen
and take the time,
to make me feel and be,
phenomenal, wise, sensual
and beautiful beside.

i love you,
best, in my bed.
moving slow and sure,
undressed, silk and velvet.
as we express,
the reality of our love
and whisper words,
well known,
and cry to heaven above.

i love you,
then, here, now and eons
on.
even after the worlds
memory of us,
is  nothing,
dust upon the breeze
our love,
will carry, forth
stardust on heaven's winds
and cries of our love and ecstasy
will birth worlds anew

and the word
                 rolled of my tongue
raced past my lips
          to pratt fall to the floor,
buster keaton style
      only to lie in a curlicue
puddle on
the ***** sky blue lino....

people applaud my performance
in a politely
dissaffected way,
before
returning to they desultory
gossip with regard  to
the state of the art draped
upon the walls....
strange blueprint of
                  mug ulgy beasts.
they say, in excellent      
                 babylonian accents
dropping
tibits of manna cake
and spilling ambrosia nectar
all the while....

**** me
i am  going to have to
get the clouds steam cleaned again... hope
monsoonal cleaners are'nt
busy this week..

and the word squiggled away to hide in the corner

this was meant to be a minute,
but then i began to spin it
and the words just took a hold,
so bold so bright
thrown like torches
into the indigo night
casting shadows on the back of
the retreating blocked,
blockhead blight,
setting grass and tree alight,  
loosing  now the tight hold
of  poetblock fear
loosening the reins of rage
making the transition
into the feathered thing
that takes flight
and flys upward
on mirrored wing
to the sky,  
not tethered
but also raw
and unweathered
unlimited by time,
but destined to fall
as energy becomes
one with all,
did not touch moon ,
did not see the sun
but this minutě wordmoth
soared and swooped
before it's minute was done
And now it flutters
down to earth,
saited and pleased
to have been..
birthed, never to die
but become byte eternal,
read once twice or more..
does not matter
wordmoths
have learnt
never
try to keep score

a poets heart...
so very far,
outside
of my,
whitebread imagination.

sun and earth,
to, two, little moons.

a man, true,
who has made mistakes,
but owns them
and then pushes on through.

a craftsman,
of a passionate poems
and substantial verse.

no idol, no god
just a man,
who deals in words.

a poet,
a heart,
a pen,
some paper,
builder, of a universe.

writer's block
again the white washed
wall just there...

curving quickly over head
like an igloo
taking creative reasoning,
stealing words and making
lost, not found the joy of creativity...

but i will fight back,
****! diddley i will
with my trusty pen
as sword....
graffiti- ing gibberish
on it's smug white washed
face...
(salmon scraping against the upward curve of the sward like steamships bumping in the old dockyard...talk to me of joy life procreation....)
marring, scarring, scribbling
away... taking back words and wordplay....
i will not be defeated,
i will not stay in this cocoon
bland and grey....
if i write hard and long
if i doodle long and short
i will see the light dawn
on a new creative day.
so watch me scribe away...
creating portholes in my cocoon
writing words to make the
block a boon....

weary soul
worn down
like sneakers
that have walked the line
far too long
the line far to thin
to make a difference
no delineation,
no real sides
to be taken
just a staging area
between the black  and grey
of a half life lived in half shadow
with the promise of
an hours sunshine
each day...

weary soul
wandering  along
to the end of this line
that peters out
in a morse code message
of mental and physical decline
a repatriation of lost time
a moments deviation defined
by years spent waiting for
a chance to rewind, declined
by a judgemental man,
signing on the dotted line

weary, wearied soul
worn out and now
just a faded memory
blown, dust to the wind
as the coffin winds down.
lines now terminated
ultimately, forever, segregated
from the life within
and on the topside,
a mourners line
thin and tired
throw soil
upon the lid

weary souls
crying for justice
but reaping sorrow
fearing for the break of morrow

marrow jelly and breaking bones
wend their way, back to broken homes
to sit on couches filled with dust
to watch television that peddle lust
and throwaway goods for throwaway lives

no call for effort,
no need to strive,
just be a drone!
live for the hive!
groan and moan,
give graft on loan
have your muttered say,
about the state of play
whilst, living lives, the deepest shade of grey
growing weary and more wearied evey day
waiting for the great big sleep
wading through beaucoup de petites morts
drowning in une petite vie


jamais las, éternellement usé
porter des clowns espadrilles
et un froncement de sourcils
*forever weary, eternally worn down
wearing clowns  sneakers and a frown

you have come
to me,
this early evening

with
a need,
to worship
at my *******.

and who am i
to deny a man,
in his need

you bare
my udders
to the world
and sigh
in adoration.

before your
thumbtip
traces the
bluevein river
that arose during
the suckling season,
years ago
and has never subsided

you are fascinated by it
for me it is a blemish
upon the milky hills
your where your fingertips
trek and wander
those same hills rise now to
ripple and bump under
your roving sheperding skin

and your tongue asks,
seeks, direction in the vale
between
with pressing lips
and murmuring breath

that thumb
intrepid leader
of the pack
has  found a peak
and with rubbing
caress has claimed it
for his own

not to be outdone
your lips grasp
and flag the other one

but be careful
my wonderful
mountaineers
i feel
an earthquake coming on

as you quest and worship
at the two peaked temple

i  sigh and mewl and groan
some goddess i am
when i am the one who begs
you the peon for mercy

but soon the peon
shall become the god
and the goddess,
a pilgrim.

then i begin
a  sacred sojuorn,
in the southern regions
as i  worship
and love and own.

letters sit
in order,
line by line
at attention,
waiting for
thoughful reading.
a road,
of sorts,
to redemption
sitting, mulling
ruminating on
scripted worth.
engaged in
conveying thought,
from mind
to page,
to mind
again cyclical,
periodic conversely,
intermittent reoccurrences.

alone most,
are little
strokes of
graphite or
ink calligraphy,
mutterings of
little intonations,
phonectic sonances,
utterings, begetting
for their,
episodic isolation,
mumbo, jumbo,
gibberish as
birthing rooms
but together
ordered, united,
babble becomes
lucent, lucid
oratory of
inordanate worth.

would i could
i would write you
a new beginning
a new once upon a time
a lifetime of joy and fullfillment
with a smattering
of sorrows for seasoning
small dissapointment
to measure victories against

would i could
i would erase all of this
put salve on the black dog's
bites
make fair the injustice
of  your loss
give you the hours, days,
years,
ripped from your hands...

have words that would
fill the empty spaces
in you...the hollowman

but i am not a diety,
just a friend, who holds
your crying body...
and claims to understand

would i could
i would turn back time
to before the hollowing
began....
and take more care
of the lives we lived
when we lived
back there

.......would i could.....would...

would that i be,
lost for an eternity.
in the sparkle
of your eyes.

would that you be,
found for an eternity.
in the upward turn
of my lips.

would, that we be,
after said eternity.
still enrapt,
in the love
of one,
for another.

for some reason,
unnown yet
i am sitting here
hot coffee in hand
transfixed by the
memory of a day
lifetimes ago.....

when i took a wrong turn
seeking a small town... and
a cobbler of  soft leather shoes...
instead i found myself
on a bush track, far too
narrow to turn my combi
van around
forced to travel on...
getting further and further
along

until, abruptly the track widened
and the most gorgeous vista
appeared
green grass, sedges and spinfex in waves,
led down to a billabong, eucalypt gums,
ghost and red,
large in size and old in years
dotted the irregular,
ameboic shape

and the water,
so clear, so clear, so clear
reflecting the cloud dusted sky,

to one side the face of a gorge, ochre red rusted
crazed weith black cracks
and green whiskery growths,
on which rock wallabies fed.
unafraid of the big lemoned
wedged combi, who sat
monolithically in their environs.

as  i disembarked,
up from the grass thicket, one thousand and one (i counted) budgerigars alight and took to the wing,
in a swirling mass of
god's whimsical glory.
the sound, a deafening
chirk-chatter and whoosh
as they, in sychron,
wheeled and turned flew over my head and back into  the bush.

needless to say, i never bothered to buy those soft
leather shoes.....

they are like,
amorphous things,
these thoughts, these half remembered dreams
floating,
like lilypads upon a pond
luscious green rounded fronds and shooting,
ponted drafts of sun....
luminescence, drifting on.
i dream in monet, today.
all fuzzed dots and pastel hues....close up, nothing new
but from a few steps back,
a picture...gorgeous to behold...
let me now... dream....
somemore....mayhap
i soon will see, immpression:
             soliel levent

time kaliedescopes
yesterdays, nows and
tommorows jumble
in glittering jewels
hopes from earlier
become wistful dreams
hopes for later, mists
to be gathered in butterfly nets
dreams of now circle like
koi in a  pond,
hypnotic in their gliding
silent world

we stand on the precipice
waiting for echoes to return
waiting for an updraught
of heady confidence
to give us impetous
to allow us spread
our gossamer wings
we wait for the sun
to warm us, to bring the rush
of blood to our heads
so that we may jump
and soar in the yonder
so that our feet may feel
the caress of  impossibilty
and clouds can tickle our soles

we wait...

it is you....
i love,
not because
of your looks,
tho many a head they turn

it is you ....
i love
not because
of the beauty of your blue green eyes,
tho many a time they have
raked my body
and left me,
naked and wanting.

it is you....
i love
not because of your hands
so gentle and strong
they,
that make works of art.

it is you i love
not because of your
generous heart
that gives with no thought
of cost or recall.

it is you....
i love
because you...
first saw me
and came through
the labarynthine traps 
and minefields...
to my frightened heart

you came...
took me by the hand,
and led me
to my
betterdays
it is you....it is you

you are,

my beauty to behold,
my strength to grow old,
my youth blessed, de-messed,
clean clarity, clear faced best.

you are,

my light in dark stairwells,
my long lingering farewell,
my langishing sighs
and final goodbyes,
rueful, regretful, redfaced rest.

you are,

my trial and tribulation,
my awkard salutations,
my pause in transmission,
stupid, careless intermission,
flayed, flensing, flesh rending test.

you are,

my hope for brighter,
my hearts renewing delight,
my compass' new bearing,
fresh, freedoms flight
upward, ever upward
from dark nights behest.

you are,

my inside, outside, beside,

you are,

my internal, eternal guide,
my passion, my power, my pride.

you are,

looking  back at me,
from the mirrors' inside.

you were my yesteryear.
when you ruled,
as the pop-**** queen,
atheletic and cool.

me,i was one of the
weird, vibe tribe.
theatre mad, and
a library hound.
you barely knew,
i was around.

but we lived in,
a small, small town
and you,
dated my brother
so you only, iced me gently.

it was surreal,
truly dali-esque.
to see you today...
i would not,
have known
you....
so faded, grey..and overblown.

we have all got older,
but the years,
have...
mugged you
and left
you beaten, battered
and low...

you tell me
you were done,
with living,
about two husbands ago.


and now just plod
through, each day,
willing the dark grey
to swallow you whole.
staying, living only for
your son Tim.
you say all this,
while ,
heavily, perspiring,
pure gin.

you cry and the tears,
run down the cracks
in your leathered,
over-sunned skin
and down to pool,
on your blowsy breast,
clad in ***** pink polar fleece.

my heart, curls in pity,
for you have fallen far.
as you sit and drink,
gifted coffee, talk about
when you were the star,
the brightest, prettiest,
flame by far.

and as i leave you,
sitting, dejected and depressed.
there is a little, heartfelt shame, in the fact,
that throughout
our untimely meeting,
i could not recall your name.

swallomp, swallomp
HE the,  
smallsmiled, muckfrumper
swiped at his scnocklezogger

HE, must be comin down
with a squiffsquizzley...
he hoped not....

HE just HATED visiting the
Tristlings they POKED
cold, fizzfiginflers in awkward places,
like under your
spiztigwungle
and down your
floppleplagger
and then, gives you,
two mattmuttertrogs,
to have instead of dinner
and says....
you should feel prankyfilck,
by coddleslidiggetty.

but in the meantime....
no more,
squiggl-ing, dibbl-ing,
pivbabl-ong or tonggypaffle.

HE, the smallsmiled, muckfrumper,
tapped his stotching,
three times,
spun on the toes of his
zibdinkers
and wished for
luck and good health.
it was too good a stonkploffli
day to have a, mickering,
sqiffsquizzley.

swomple, swomple,swomp...

upon the thorny cane,
of a rose's trailing bush,
walks a lady bird.

all dressed in orange-red
n' black....
she toils in a bustling way,
to the very tip of the wood
and then after a moment's
thoughtful balancing....

she alights....
incogurously beautiful,
as she all but hovers,
in the warm rose scented air.

and then she sets her course,
for who knows where
and zig zags her way...
to over there...

happiness bumbling
along on glossy spotted wing