Here's to all my Aussie friends.

You fought with bravery and honor
at Kimberley, Passchendaele,
Gallipoli, Romani, Crete,
Tobruck, Milne Bay, Yongju
and even in Vietnam.

And I know why you did it.

Abounding in your back yards
were stalking cassowaries, spiders
that rot your flesh, invisible
but lethal jelly fish,
Coastal Taipan and Brown snakes,
not to mention saltwater crocodiles
Great White sharks, Stone Fish,
blue ringed octopi and
the odd Marble Cone Snail.

War must have seemed safe
compared to he horrors of home.

Here's to you mates. Fair Dinkum.
I would have been on the first
transport out, too.

  ~mce

An Aussie digger
killed in battle
but disinclined to die
returns to the front line
as a spectre
wearing a slouch hat
and a larrikin grin.

Draped in a tattered flag
he yells
'Remember Korea, lads
and Vietnam
and how we went
all the way
with Menzies and L.B.J.'

'Don't forget Gallipoli
men
or the fight for peace
with George
in Iraq and Afghanistan
against Al Qaeda
and the Taliban.

'Defeat the enemy
mates
to secure the future
as our heritage
of service
patriotism and pride
in U. S foreign policies.'

And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda**

When I was a young man I carried my pack
And I lived the free life of a rover
From the Murrays green basin to the dusty outback
I waltzed my Matilda all over
Then in nineteen fifteen my country said Son
It's time to stop rambling 'cause there's work to be done
So they gave me a tin hat and they gave me a gun
And they sent me away to the war
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As we sailed away from the quay
And amidst all the tears and the shouts and the cheers
We sailed off to Gallipoli

How well I remember that terrible day
How the blood stained the sand and the water
And how in that hell that they called Suvla Bay
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter
Johnny Turk he was ready, he primed himself well
He chased us with bullets, he rained us with shells
And in five minutes flat he'd blown us all to hell
Nearly blew us right back to Australia
But the band played Waltzing Matilda
As we stopped to bury our slain
We buried ours and the Turks buried theirs
Then we started all over again

Now those that were left, well we tried to survive
In a mad world of blood, death and fire
And for ten weary weeks I kept myself alive
But around me the corpses piled higher
Then a big Turkish shell knocked me **** over ***
And when I woke up in my hospital bed
And saw what it had done, I wished I was dead
Never knew there were worse things than dying
For no more I'll go waltzing Matilda
All around the green bush far and near
For to **** tent and pegs, a man needs two legs
No more waltzing Matilda for me

So they collected the cripples, the wounded, the maimed
And they shipped us back home to Australia
The armless, the legless, the blind, the insane
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla
And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay
I looked at the place where my legs used to be
And thank Christ there was nobody waiting for me
To grieve and to mourn and to pity
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As they carried us down the gangway
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared
Then turned all their faces away

And now every April I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me
And I watch my old comrades, how proudly they march
Reliving old dreams of past glory
And the old men march slowly, all bent, stiff and sore
The forgotten heroes from a forgotten war
And the young people ask, "What are they marching for?"
And I ask myself the same question
And the band plays Waltzing Matilda
And the old men answer to the call
But year after year their numbers get fewer
Some day no one will march there at all

Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me
And their ghosts may be heard as you pass the Billabong
Who'll come-a-waltzing Matilda with me?

The movie speaks
In silence screams
That encapsulates the feeling of the moment.
A black and white
Scene plays out
And I see the sorrow pour.

The reflection of the many lives that costed during
The era
Reflects on the black and white dots
That move around on my screen.

Wilhelm.
******.
Mussolini.
Gallipoli.
The Somme.

It's funny how they don't speak
But the black and white dots that
Dance
And flickers on my screen,
Tells the unfortunate story
Of the contextual history

That lies behind,
The black and white dots that
Strafes on my screen.

you know one thing i hated as a kid, is not being included, because every kid

wants to be included, i love life, i love to PARTY, i love being normaL I hate nothing

nothing at all, you see i had this friend named patrick back in those days, and he

never yelled at me, i hear him  yelling at me  in my head, but that is the cosmos, you

see i tried to be like him, because he helped me more than anyone else, took me to jimmy barnes

concerts, and i liked him, and he took me to nye parties, and we certainly partied all night

even when i crashed over his house, cause i didn’t want to show dad how ****** i was, pat

never yelled like a *****, but i turned out to be a ***** in the end, because i had too much

creative energy i had to get rid of, and i was a ****, until i started seeing carers, they have all

helped me by making me understand that he ain’t my daddy, but i still wanted to see him

but i have to realise, we are adults now, and we have to grow up, when i am watching chris rock

i am hearing nonsense voices of my mates hating black people but i learnt from the messiah that

black people are good comedians and good athletes, there is a lot of knowledge in black people

more so than in white people, blacks are struggling day in and day out, while us whites get it easy

and i am saying patrick was the nicest white person i have ever met after meeting a few aussies at

the cricket, i liked patrick back then because he helped me understand a bit about my family, to whom

i used to get cranky with, well, mainly he was showing me what my family was doing with them, ya know

the other kids, anyway, i have no ideas what patrick is doing now, but i hope he is working in a top high class job

because i am an artist, and writer and youtube entertainer, when i go to bed, i ain’t like canary bird, and i ain’t

a koomarri man, i just fall asleep on the bed with the radio on to keep me company, and when i yell at my voices

i am basically saying, i AM THE BIG PARTY PERSON, I PROVIDE PARTIES FOR ALL, i have moved out now

so come on DUDES, because going out is fun, patrick taught me that, my head is saying, he didn’t wanna do that

because i don’t like yelling at people, i prefer if i yell, i yell at the cosmos, because bailey from the show NEIGHBOURS

‘when he yelled, he looked like a CRAZY person, making the man say ‘YOU’RE CRAZY BAILS’ and that man who said

that told bailey he was crazy, reminded me of patrick, in the way of saying, patrick was a very nice person, he didn’t have to yell

if i meet patrick again, i will explain i am an artist and writer and youtube ****** and then i will tell patrick, i have always liked the computer

it’s just that i like going out having fun too, i have been thrown out of houses or flats, but patrick never did, so that makes him

number 1, out of school chums who i mucked with at school, and i like the joke by chris rock, men can’t go backwards sexually while

women can’t go backwards in lifestyle, i know we said imagine what lylle would do, here, imagine what lyle would, there, imagine

what lyle would in any place, yeah mate yeah, i am cool, i remember playing heavy metal music loud with patrick, as well and playing

basketball as well,  now patrick, whether he liked christmas or not, he still put his xmas tree up, i can tell you one thing though, i am

a buddhist who loves christian holidays, and i had fun teasing the old army men, who fought and died for this country, you see

this year is the 100 th year of gallipoli, and it’s an oldie thing to tease with music now, because young army codgers are in it

to be there for their country, patrick is a heavy metal ******, mainly liking jimmy barnes and me, as cronus put dad in barnesy’s family

as his little granddaughter betty, so dad, the old army codger from way back can learn the nice parts of jimmy barnes

i remembered patrick singing when your love is gone, and i liked him singing it, but i was looking at his legs, i was CRAZY

because i shouldn’t look at people’s legs, i am not gay, i am a man with problems, i have changed from all that nonsense of my minds past

i am now the new and improved brian allan, but i realise that patrick might not like me saying this, but he helped me, by not getting cranky AT me

i just want to make peace with my good mate, opatrick, because, he might have been ******* with my criime

and because of that crime, and because he was nice, when i saw he was cranky, i left him to head down the mall to be big bad brian

and the best way to get a guy over to a girl’s house, is put a ***  on the stove and you will have every man breaking down your door

you see, i was hearing crazy teasing in my head, and patrick’s voice was saying, is he trying to be like mr allan, i thought he was trying

to be like us, tease him, fight him, bully him around, and patrick still doesn’t know that channel 9’s karl stefanovic reminded me of patrick’s cool kid

to my mind but i have to tread to carefully there because patrick might have been trying to be like craig from kingswood country, he might hate

karl stefanovic, it’s just he reminded me of patrick, what is wrong with visions, pat might hate karl stefanovic, well his cool kid does anyway

and my cool kid is ***** hogan and sam marshall, patrick is a young dude figure

Paul Bunyan is up and at 'em
with his trusty **** wacker, slicing
through to the other side
of suburban nightmare. Zeus,
in barreling breath, holds low
his mighty leaf blower.

An American hero and Greek god,
hell bent on getting what's
greener on the other side, begin their
Battle of the Lusher Lawn.

Paul's Babe, in her royal blueness,
is star-studded and singing, "Glory Glory"
as she banners the front porch
in red and white stripes. Zeus' sister-bride
Hera, turns a goat on spit, thinking,
"these Americans know nothing about
good barbeque." Later, the two will be
promising recipes over the side fence
of their baba ganoush and ambrosia salad.

The boys will be reminiscing Gallipoli,
slapping each others' backs,
and choking back tears.

It was going to be the trip of a lifetime. Sydney, Cairo, Constantinople, maybe even Jerusalem if there was time and breath left in us. We came from the far-flung reaches of the earth to the bustling capitals of the Middle East. Just me, my good mates -  Blue, Grim and his cousin Frank - our chaperone Sergeant Major O’Donnell, and 1,500 other lads of the 1st Australian Light Horse Brigade.

Frank copped it at Gallipoli, never even set foot on the beach. I left him screaming on the metal deck of the landing craft awash with ***** and blood as he watched his innards unfurl. ****** oath, they stunk! Like ten-day-old snags left out in the Adelaide sun. His Mum always said she’d have his guts for garters if he enlisted underage. I reckon she’d never use that expression again. She was a nice lady too, that Mrs Gibson.

Tell me, fair dinkum, what do 18-year-old, daring-do dreamers from Parramatta know of the chain of high command, a war of geopolitical strategy and stiff upper lips. The bewhiskered gentlemen who manoeuvre their pieces in imperial map rooms will live to fight another day, and yet hold their fallen troops accountable for the unpredictable tides of history.

Grim took Frank’s death hard. From that day on his war was one explosive suicide mission. In the end, he walked into a spray of Turkish gunpowder at Chunuk Bair. The Distinguished Conduct Medal he earned that day sits on my mantelpiece beside a photo of the four of us at Giza. His sister Molly, my dear sweet Molly, turned out to be the love of my life. Funny how that happens - the threads that hold us together, the ties that bind brothers, the strangers who become our saviours.

The sergeant major succumbed to typhoid fever in Palestine and that left Blue and me. We sit and remember. We laugh at the horror during the day and shiver in our beds at night. We wage war with ourselves, our choices, our victories and defeats. We marvel at the world and the territorial ambition of nations, shake our heads at the repetition of dumb history, and raise our wavering fists to those same men in their ivory towers. It’s in all the newspapers that the Vietnam conflict is this generation’s Dardanelles Campaign. ‘A vain and protracted engagement fought in a topographically hostile arena with disproportionate loss of life’ is what I read. Yet wonder of wonders, a Yank - Blue knows his name...but I forget...Neville Someone - walked on the moon last month. Do y’reckon we helped to make that happen? Four cobbers from New South Wales, who had a knack with horseflesh and a taste for kangaroo feathers, on an adventure which spanned more lifetimes than I could ever have imagined.