The world has become a breeding ground for evil
Everyone clouded in darkness as thick as fog on a rainy morning
Demons constantly itching to corrupt even the most innocent of minds
Drowning in our own heads,
Barely staying afloat
The darkness creeps in to claim it's prize.
Our Humanity.

~sdr

tree stumps burnt black
no koalas in sight
only tracks
and charred embers
of nature’s wrath

indigenous insight ignored
to dingo’s demise

what does a bushman know
that lord sydney doesn’t?

surely, the conquering clan
and its bellicose band of einsteins
hear the kangaroos’ scream
from the smoldering
ledge
of extinction

a choking ode
to imperial exuberance

~ P

night covers all;
as critters crawl crosstown
casting graffiti shadows over
walls and huddled mounds
of despair

I encountered one
wrong-turned
down a cul-de-sac
off northside

a weathered boot
caught my eye

I swerved and sweared
sparing bones
and medicaid

but for the moon
and rearview magic,
my conscience would've been stained
in homeless blood

~ P

There will be protests
deputations
demonstrations
lies, truth, and repudiations,
until
the situation's beyond our
control,

but we're fooling no one
because no one's listening
there'll be no one watching
as we hit the switch.

They can't conscript me
because I'm elderly
also
I'm in hiding
and they're on a hiding
to,
to nothing.

Where is yesterday?
He is young, he is small, he wishes the world had more secrets
so the world supplies them all.

When is tomorrow?
He continues; I stifle laughter through smiles as I haven’t answered his first question,
yet he has already paraded forward.

How big is the sky?
I tell him it’s infinite, that it’s as deeply blue as the sea is deep,
and that, any day of the week, he could wish to soar through it-...

Can I make my wishes come true?
I pause, for I want to say yes, want to see his eyes light up like fireworks, want to feel his joy,
but for this, I must say no.

… Can you answer all of my questions?
He is curious, careful, cautiously dancing around the idea that I don’t know it all;
I eventually find my way to say, “No, but one day you will answer them all."