Municipal Gum was written by Oodjeroo Noonecaal. Municipal Gum is about the changes in society and the tendency of people to want to control everything. Oodjeroo uses various techniques to convey this idea.

At the beginning of the poem Oodjeroo is addressing the tree. This immediately creates empathy for both the tree and her people. By the last line she has emphasised this with the pronoun “us” to show that they suffer a similar fate.

This poem expresses how life in Australia has changes especially for Aboriginal people. In the first half of the poem Oodjeroo is talking about how life was for her and others. It explores the changes in society and the displacement of the Aboriginal people from their land.

“Whose head hung…Its hopelessness”, the author uses this as further re-iteration of the immorality of the situation and by the use of analogy comparing the tree to her people to further emphasise the shame and lack control of that the Europeans have inflicted upon her and the environment.

Oodjeroo uses extended metaphor technique in the very first line of the poem ‘Hard bitumen around your feet’. This means that the gumtree has been placed in the city scape where it is suppressed and not allowed to spread out and be unique in its own way. This is clear and immanently direct link to the pain and suffering endured by the Aborigines post European settlement.

Oodjeroo uses vivid language to present these ideas. For example the use of the word castrated is very effective. The connotation of the word is very demeaning. With castration often comes a sense of a loss of pride and power. The word castration is symbolic of how Oodjeroo feels the European have treated Aboriginal people and the environment. Castration also refers to the fact that what is done is done. Nothing can undo what they did and the damaged they have caused.

Other symbolism includes the title “Municipal Gum”, municipal meaning community, implies that the gumtree belongs to the community. One of the vast differences between European and Aboriginal law is that Aboriginal people did not believe in the ownership of land or of animals and plants. Municipal Gum is a reference to the Europeans assumptions that everything is theirs to own and control.

The rhetorical question, “O fellow citizen, What have they done to us?” is the conclusion of the implications that have been made throughout the poem. Oodjeroo, is advocating for her people and all things wronged by the controlling behaviour of the Europeans. Rhetorical questions are used to provoke thought and to stimulate a pre-determined response. “What have they done to us?” They have “castrated, broken… strapped and buckled” and ultimately changed things to a point that they cannot be fixed.

In conclusion, Municipal Gum is a poem about the constrictions and change that the European invaders forced upon the Aboriginal community and the environment she believes that the Europeans have deemed themselves ever powerful and practice their power in a manner that is immoral.

It was on Hallowe'en when we said we'd meet;
as we thought it might be romantically spooky;
and I trotted gaily along the pathway
through the dimly-lit park
where the predator ******* maniacs roamed
hoping for a bit of backdoor action
and my excited little heart went
"YI YI YI YI YI YAAAAARRRGGGHHH!"
with eager anticipation
of a hot new nymphomaniac date.

We had been a-texting with
ever-increasing frankness
for several weeks and I was beginning
to get tired of wiping the keyboard clean
after each bout of frenzied
manual self-stimulation
which she had boldly urged me to
and the built-in camera was out of order
because of the damp ***** build-up.

I found the pictures she sent me
stimulating to say the very least
especially the one with the melon
peeping out from between her legs
and I found her blood-red eyes
rather exciting really
once I got used to them;
and I was quite looking forward
to the love bites she promised me
which was why I had washed my neck
with particular attention to the blackheads.

Promptly at the stroke of midnight
my putative mistress arrived
with a ******* great clap of thunder
and to say I was surprised by her sulphurous breath
would be putting it mildly
and the fifty-five inch waist
was a bit of a disappointment,
and I honestly and truly think
she might have mentioned
the suppurating scabs
and oozing boils
or at least hinted at them.

As I fought the ravening hell-***** off
with the hatchet I had wisely brought
in my briefcase as a safety precaution
once more I rued my innocence:
how many times have I been let down
after such high hopes from internet dating
and yet - trusting soul that I am -
I had again let my heart go astray.

Once it was all over
and I gazed down at her hideous
and mutilated corpse bleeding
and twitching on the ****** bitumen,
I lifted up her skirt
just to check the melon photo
hadn't been a fake;
and although there was no large
piece of fruit in situ at the time
I could see it had always
been a very real possibility.

Built on the Berkley model
Paid for with mothers essential oils
...a bitumen

And a flower blooms from Medicine Rock
Like a ballerina

As the Old Man weeps joyfully

I (Bread and Music)

Music I heard with you was more than music,
And bread I broke with you was more than bread;
Now that I am without you, all is desolate;
All that was once so beautiful is dead.

Your hands once touched this table and this silver,
And I have seen your fingers hold this glass.
These things do not remember you, beloved,
And yet your touch upon them will not pass.

For it was in my heart you moved among them,
And blessed them with your hands and with your eyes;
And in my heart they will remember always,--
They knew you once, O beautiful and wise.

II

My heart has become as hard as a city street,
The horses trample upon it, it sings like iron,
All day long and all night long they beat,
They ring like the hooves of time.
My heart has become as drab as a city park,
The grass is worn with the feet of shameless lovers,
A match is struck, there is kissing in the dark,
The moon comes, pale with sleep.
My heart is torn with the sound of raucous voices,
They shout from the slums, from the streets, from the crowded places,
And tunes from the hurdy-gurdy that coldly rejoices
Shoot arrows into my heart.

III

Dead Cleopatra lies in a crystal casket,
Wrapped and spiced by the cunningest of hands.
Around her neck they have put a golden necklace,
Her tatbebs, it is said, are worn with sands.
Dead Cleopatra was once revered in Egypt,
Warm-eyed she was, this princess of the South.
Now she is old and dry and faded,
With black bitumen they have sealed up her mouth.
O sweet clean earth, from whom the green blade cometh!
When we are dead, my best beloved and I,
Close well above us, that we may rest forever,
Sending up grass and blossoms to the sky.

IV

In the noisy street,
Where the sifted sunlight yellows the pallid faces,
Sudden I close my eyes, and on my eyelids
Feel from the far-off sea a cool faint spray,--
A breath on my cheek,
From the tumbling breakers and foam, the hard sand shattered,
Gulls in the high wind whistling, flashing waters,
Smoke from the flashing waters blown on rocks;
--And I know once more,
O dearly beloved! that all these seas are between us,
Tumult and madness, desolate save for the sea-gulls,
You on the farther shore, and I in this street.

Out of the seething cauldron of my woes,
Where sweets and salt and bitterness I flung;
Where charmed music gathered from my tongue,
And where I chained strange archipelagoes
Of fallen stars; where fiery passion flows
A curious bitumen; where among
The glowing medley moved the tune unsung
Of perfect love: thence grew the Mystic Rose.

Its myriad petals of divided light;
Its leaves of the most radiant emerald;
Its heart of fire like rubies. At the sight
I lifted up my heart to God and called:
How shall I pluck this dream of my desire?
And lo! there shaped itself the Cross of Fire!

Snow's melted, and all she's got left is the cone,
the skeletal bone streets, where she was
yesterday once so Snowwhite pretty.

Mountainous mounds of **** from canine and human kind
allude to beasts that roamed these streets in nights gone by.
They thought their tracks and cigarettes butts were covered
in a cloak of snow, but sun can't wash away sin.

All she's got left is the grit, beneath fingernails, iron rails,
bitumen - Pech! - from clinging on too long to yesterday.

It’s almost 6, and the night is fighting with the last rays of sun,
Its armor and sword are both stronger the glow of sun, Stars comes out like your eyes, breathing down my neck,
Sitting across the Chinese restaurant in, with a cigarette dangling in your fingers blazing as harshly as bitumen laying on road as your skin on my skin was last night
You have been constantly eying me like I am breast of the freshly cut chicken,
I take slow sips of my beer, opening and reopening my fortune cookie, but it’s already been cracked and my fate has been sealed,
I pity the planets and us, we all are stuck in our orbits, and we always talk about the corruption in Russia and about pirates in Somalia,
We take detour of this city, and only this one, driving circles around the Wal-Mart, buying coffee beans and condoms,
I quiet my raging mind, which writes essays about the Greek gods and Atlantis; it fights with the night, but night plays word-games,
It twists its words into lyrics of lovers and pours them in my mouth, and twists its fingers in my ******
Its, almost 8, there are two bottles on the table, emptied like my heart, your ash tray full like your lungs with smoke and lust
Its 8, and sky is cobalt with streaks of lighter shades passing through like the Helicopters on Independence Day and I take this as my sign, and leave 20 dollar bill and a letter which screams “I’m gone”,

Bustling street and a Vegas sky welcomes my heart to the possibility of finding Atlantis.

"Chthonic literally means 'subterranean', but the word in English describes deities or spirits of the underworld,  especially in Ancient Greek religion."

Star Park the latter in the loving mercies of Christ Jesus
to his he went out into the provinces of Asia,
it's the only to pay attention to the princes of the king,
and the wives of the king and according to the Christian religion,
but do not accept that, in reality, if a bird of birds land
of their nativity Bettie T, controlled by them,
under another praetor, the signs of Dumuzid would seem
to be oh, Manuel, Manuel, wind and cold at the grass of Ishtar.
The women of the head of the woman, the children of men
& instead of the sun and moon the sight of the girl's, |
red, dark, women and men were naked; and whites who,
under the years, and the manner of the city: |
For example, in hot die, when they come to a large part
of the queen of the death of the, to them, Jesus, when he is a poet,
this pleases me, obscurely and left to go to the space
of and into snooch, the J great star of light from the sun,
come to the land of the gods and of the sea, the first money
the best Jesus hair living American Beauty, I think Radio
verse's fiery cold heart of Americans finds Sky hell Street
to carry a dream in the middle kids water finds **** blue poetry
in their hands, in the air mainly an old ***** woman in a woman's
****** child but English spirits yellow moon baby;
thinking *** brown foot book paradise is free to write,
to read the little people to write drunk next to the summer
making images of the Standard window trash;
Medusa's Simian rocks to fall rather than friends' French kiss
O really happy to change to the rich history of the Russian blind nature
of public plucking School of Christ States Secret is gay in the morning,
why is this mad God's mirror Heroicum; O T Bettie warns of birds;
It seems that the cold, the wind, the grass of the sign of the praetor
was Dumuzid Ishtar, Manuel, Manuel. Women gloves eyes only
"red girl black female naked figures", dressed in years of heat and roles
of the Queen's death, Jesus said to them:
This is the peoples who spoke
to him freely, but did not give snooch
to the large electricity from the stars, the sun
and the earth god of the sea
because the first of the best hair is of the price will be signs,
American Beauty, the sun's rays have warmed the heart of the American dream, the Sky over hell is alive,
Street *** kids come out of the blue water
and picking up pamphlets hands them to heaven,
to an old ***** woman,
or a woman, what is interior, from the time of the English people
yellow yellow is the color of the moon, I think, brown,
at the feet of the garden,
to the strangers not friendly: for whatever you want to,
there is not time to write, and read, in a short time
it should be built-in into the summer,
a drunken man staggers in his *****, who made the that is,
from the Latin widow pictures of the rock
and the nuclear plant's "BILEX" monkey to call French
friends and investors to turn a rich history of publicity
into plucking the blind nature of the Russian School
in the morning,                 where the Spanish ******
are in cheerful wilderness;       why aren't they mad at the authoritarian
bank officials of Heroicum's way to help take care of the hair
at the bed and sleep fled their bitterness and harshness |: DNA; noun: deoxyribonucleic acid, a self-replicating material present in nearly all
living organisms as the main constituent of chromosomes.
It is the carrier of genetic information. The fundamental and distinctive characteristics or qualities of someone or something,
especially when regarded as unchangeable. "diversity is part of the company's DNA" of fire conditions going to sleep,
*** drive slots DNA-RNA-NNA. [ribonucleic acid,
a nucleic acid present in all living cells.
Its principal role is to act as a messenger carrying
instructions from DNA for controlling the synthesis of proteins,
although in some viruses RNA rather than DNA carries the genetic information. The king on the list, that is,     of the number of books
Sumirian Dunezid not get up early in the morning,
begging the Sumerian Dumuzid Zelaya.
You, since we came into the cause of the actions
were conspicuous amongst them all,                           that they should say,
that it is not that by which we men from Cornelius
had made the heart is in the marketplace, my AP will be great,  YAUNO orunum was the heroic one person is         |                                 the force,
      and that while he was in the way,
by means of which the cancer the oxygen in the Impala
and there were no free Doozid.
In the first war, the dictatorship of the horsemen,             And in the night,
$1000 for the head of linen cloth,
and to buy that Aleksander is antisocial,           |    Bob;
the Star Park and go into the bowels of
And the rest of the king, that hath heard that Asia plays neuronucleic acid
of the wives, and the Christian religion;
this is the cause of anything,      through the most difficult,
but also in the two days, if there is in the land of the birds,
Bettie T acting as though we should live soberly,
and the other which concerns the praetor;
Oh, Manuel, Manuel having set out would see to Dumuzid's
Ishtar grass wet and cold.   The key to
many people's sunset lapses and a girl
women, the naked, black, blind, and by black I mean
Under years, and now a city,                   for example,
Queen's provision of the dead
When the poet was,              and as they had decreed,
that he was                made,     |            and, therefore,
snooch, and in the darkness,
J and the light of a great star in the sun,            and to the land of the gods,
When Jesus was onto another American Beauty,
And I think in light of America radio
Sky Street hell to find a middle kids dream alive
When a blue sky
But ***** brown yellow old woman
was buried in a baby book that I think should be free
to write the moon; I invite people to not drink of the gods

And the fish that are the feet: I have alchemy,
Blessed is the man who fears the Lord
Once in white Chthonic. While the younger kids are you,
to speak to his neighbor with a tempest in a guitar
should u be beholden to the chords,
Bitumen was funded in part by DNA's bitter six rushing
to the halfway point. The king on the list, that is,
if the book has value is the Sumerian Dunezid, nor to wake up early;
CNN has not published in the Sumerian Dumuzid Zelaya.
Oh, that this would only speak to the heart of steel;
AP Ya'akan orunum great man and a house of Cornelius;
pain-free was struck, no and I left with the edge of his feet Aquarius alchemy, see Lord will give thanks to the Lord to speak
to some terminal fitting white-haired Tethys buildings
Friends guitar dogs and waves Mary, who is waiting
to talk the kids out of the way to help take care of their weapons'
frost caves wearing the *** drive excitement until the last DNA
pan of bitter bitterness.

King on the list, which means that if the value of books
Sumirian Dunezid, white, do not get up early in the morning,
grilled published in Sumerian Dumuzid Zelaya.
Oh, the parent would say that if he had not had the courage
to Forum Cornelius, a mighty man of great Ya'akan Orunum AP,
was struck by the very pain-free, and so it is not a man
she could dispel Doozid. the fine linen, out of the mouth
of the head and, if the armies of the forces the driver,
and all his antisocial dictatorship, with two existing priors
to conquer, after all the father of Aleksander for Bob
to buy in the night, 1000,      the prince of the eyes of the rest
of the cities of Agbarus the descendants of Romulus,
the sun,         the writer of the air is one
of the seven United States that can hit *****,       Press surely,
with the Besillus, and less than TL lower part flowed on,
and the sister of the board to the rectors,
if the governor that was in the ark,      the leaders were due to in Eros Park,    the Asian Asian I am saying to the wise men, the diets
of eating the Komputer watching if the channels,
in groups of a number of 2 folks are with money,
and I was advancing with child, and mothers,
I will bring forth I wade Bay stripper Bettie Christian
allotted to repair Huntersville perpetual education of the vote
if the general bicycle changes to change the state Museum surely,
if they sing a song, Iran recently Maecenas has its eyes on the belt
of ESTHER [TIM of the AFL-CIO 500] The rise out
of the yard nun's having fun, fun with members
of the same members of the Islamic religion may put air
windback I cast far and 'eek!' feel easy,
because it means the O honey takes care of the city's charts
for Sarah's maid, the judge or the judge if he does not?
E: Oh, if you remove the 2 to 1 have problems detected.
The third party to whom the request
is made a commander in chief of Monotone Pictures:
Cancerbury 6 Bay of Plenty Double Bay from all over me.
Oh Dumuzid Dumuzid one year to work down to the grass.
If you ignore the cause of half despite the awful *** from Iraq.
Oh, glory and the West Semitic names
and saws the old legs off
and the way students in the United States
and the United Dumuzid Summitian Manuel did want to marry.
"If the President of the Sumerians arrives with his ENVOY,
the governor, 1, when the Greek governor
says Dr. Dumuzid is driving to the East."

Morning pallor on a grey day
not a five cent shine
to the sun.

Bitumen hissed all night
trees tossed and tangoed
shuddered and split.

Navy clouds, blue with rain
surfed in from the ocean
racing on the wild wind
learning to scream.

The stones listened
moon listed and tried to find
a space in the cloud-tide rush
to quiet-light the gloom.

Morning Armistice on a pale grey day
of debris and displacement
refugees and leaf litter
surrender and detachment
silent and still
only a five cent shine to the sun

© M.L.Emmett

Ferryman, will I rest in the white roses
that can nevermore grow infirm-
where the rivers from the deep blue forest
are joined by currents of blood and ink?

Ferryman, the forest of the sky is beautiful
like blue bitumen, verdigris life moves, expires and is
reborn between the plane of those who do not die
and above the garden of grief

"Come brother, let us sleep" the phantom says
"One-Hundred and Fifty cuts cover me from head to waist-
old and beautiful tears that keep me from sleep
The heat of my lamp is ready to fade"

Ferryman,where in the house of shade shall I finally rest?
The voice of my lord is broken and dried
In the glade of cedar trees, air flushes and suffocates
The blushing of the moonlight fades and the snowy stars elude her

Make me know the ways of righteousness
The ferryman leads me down the tremulous waters
his words have escaped me like the fearful night's eyes
and in the distance the sudden emptiness of the roses

Glowing Windows embedded into mouldy brick walls
Ivy climbing the gutters of neighbourhood roofs
Skies becoming burnt out like charred blackened fields

Tall spiny trees project shadows onto the road below
Leaves curl up to receive some weakening light from above
A formation of sputtering cars cling to each turn they decide to make
Cloudy milky light bounces off faulty windows that exhale the aroma of somebodies impending supper

A heavy truck manoeuvres itself into the blistered bitumen horizon
Dry deflated branches make obscene gestures towards passers-by
Gardeners rummage through their bags as they near the end of their working day
Their faces filled with an expired enthusiasm for breathing

Parked hunks of metal pelted with dead itchy leaves
Windscreen wipers hold fragile twigs down against grotty neglected glass
Chain-link fences link disparate housing and the sleeping people within
Some dispirited unsatisfied psychos gaze up as they catch a moving bus

Smoky Incense billows down from some apartment balcony
The air becomes cold and sharply fills these ordinary streets
Engine sounds try to supress the divine quietness
They only merge into it

Now the stars are out and about
Bright specks waddling in an aerial pool of dark blue
You turn the key and walk through the front door

It began outside a stable
Town of Bethlehem 2000 years ago
Shepherds left their fileds in awe
To find Jesus in wooden manger
       Two lines to choose back then
One compulsory, one was not
Caesar's census; revenue and crowd control
Other line was quiet; sanctified, seeking Christ Child
Wise men far away, figured, joined the queue
Followed the star, joined the queue

On sand and snow or bitumen black
Trekking fields, forests thick or cities tall
Across the earth, people know
       Where to find the queue
Not online; Get up and go
Christmas Eve or Christmas Day
Local churches, chapels small
Country barns, church cafes
Line up outside the doors
       Worship Jesus

I drive my bus
Full of grotty kids and lunatics
On the bitumen dream
Where middle aged mothers with boxers' eyes
Weep from the sidewalks of toy-trashed suburbs.

Driving my bus,
Through the unfolding flower of dawn
And through the tangled tears of night
Where the boisterous poor
Wilt in their gardens of excess.

Driving them home,
Driving lover to lover,
To their acrobatic fields of fire,
Driving the madman raging in his seat
And the girls with rainbows in their eyes.

Driving
Driving
Into the sorrow beyond the sky
And into the hollows of the lonely hearts
Who linger, speechless, at my ear,
As we drive, and drive.

Where the gutter ghosts rattle their dying coughs
Into the emptiness of night
And the half-cocked girls smoke toughness and cool
And the burning boys
Writhe in the furnace of desire.

The streets are crying in the pools of time
And the dogs are howling in the summers of their heat
While the ladies are waiting at the corners of our youth
With their handbag smiles,
And the faces we will never see again
Go sliding, Go sliding by.

Luna (Latine Lunae) est terrae sola naturalis satellite. [E] [F] [VIII] licet non amet naturalis satellitis in Systemate Solare est, inter satellites maioribus signis maxima quod ad magnitudinem orbes obiecti (primarium) [g] [a] et post Io satellite Jovis, qui est secundus densa inter densitates satellite cognoscuntur.

Luna est in vna *** orbem terrarum, et semper, et faciens facies, *** cis insignis, quae per tenebras inter maria volcanus editis clarus, et veteri crusta impactus crateres prominent. Est enim post solem in coelo et immutari. Quanquam autem id candidissimam, obscurus etiam superficie *** bitumen reflectance fessis tantum leviter superior. Huius temporibus perquam cyclus regularem habere in coelo, quia antiquitus in luna lingua maximus culturae opes, fastos artis fabularis. Producit vim gravitatis luna dies et tempora et levi freta. Nunc de orbita lunae distantia diameter vicibus terra in caelum facit ut fere idem sit qui apparet Solis. Nempe per id fere totum solem lunam eclipsin solis tegere. Hoc simile est de magnitudine visuali fortuitum apparens. Lunaris a terra distantiae lineae sit amet, crescens ad rate of 3,82 ± 0,07 mm per annum, id est, non tamen semper. [IX]

Portrayed in an artiface
Of long and grey rhymes
Replayed in a video
Of really bad lines
Lost in a tangency
Of bitumen and brick
Tangled in quagmire
Of cigarettes and sick.

Lurching through life
In yesterdays clothes,
Acting the part
That nobody knows,
Chic desperation
Apparent to all
With the certainty
She’s for a terrible fall.

Miasma of moods
Through a *****, blue haze,
Insulting a friend
In an instant of craze,
Sprawled on the street
In a leopard skin skirt,
Makeup awry
Broken nails in the dirt.

Screaming abuse
To the well meaning hand,
Lost, alone
In a drug ridden land,
Fearful of shadows
And clinging to those
Who lustfully use
To so casually dispose.

Blond hair falling
Down over her face
Mascara running
In smears of disgrace,
It’s dangerous to stagger
Through traffic in rain
With lost high heel,
Tear streaked in pain.

Vagrants for company
Hunched in a cell,
Shivering cold
And ****** to hell
In a moment of clarity
And startlingly clear,
A small shimmering hope
Lies so distantly near.


Marshalg
@theCoalface
Victoria Park Tunnel
8th May 2010

I feel like a needle
In the groove of vinyl  
Running
Sounding
Vibrating
Singing
Her bitumen

The grooves are cut
Deep in the mud
For you to sound well
Designed
As you are

jet of bitumen,
a relaxed snaking coils
in the seeking hand.

tiny galaxies
b u    r s  t
and trinket words
shatter
all across the torched-glass plain----

frigid smouldering.
honest candescence--insulation,
clarity where the freshly birthed meet senex
and ashen widows dissipate
into thin air

I find Havisham in the glow.

The afternoon light filters in through the shutters,
that look out towards the quiet cul-de-sac;
festooned with houses and quiet green lawns.
My room's walls are licked with yellow slashes
and lattices. Evening smooths the afternoon
into darkness with its brittle fingers and those yellow
slashes are interchanged with a diffusion of white neon
from the buzzing streetlamps. Oh how noisily they buzz
next to the flowerbeds! And people fold their lawn chairs and
go into their warmly lit houses and house pets roam blackened
curbs amongst the hedge delineations between homes and old
clocks wind down throughout the houses in cul-de-sac laced with
bitumen and broken glass.

a song. “400 lux,” you said. “lorde.”
i nodded. i knew it. i loved it.
we’re never done with killing time, can i **** it with you?
first driving so slow, creeping through the dark suburban roads, the car’s headlights sweeping over front lawns and pale bitumen, breaking through the shadows from the trees on the nature strips.
then driving fast, on the highway, on the overtaking lane all the way to the city, where we wander aimlessly street by street for a long time but it’s really only an hour or so.
and then where we crash - a cosy little coffee shop with dim lighting and low seats - open twenty-four hours and the perfect place for you and me and other people like us, because there are others like us, i know it. i see them in the passing windows of crawling cars and across the cafe at two thirty am when i’m sipping my hot chocolate and holding your hand over the coffee table.
“do you ever yell at people ‘i want to *******’ but like in your head?” you asked.
i tilted my head and nodded a little.
you nodded too, leaning back in your seat relieved. “yeah. good. me too.”
and so it goes.

I think of it, sometimes
in passing that corner. or

climbing those stairs,
two bodies entangled against

the rail. getting off
the rails. did they, too

recognise something
stranger in a stranger?

something I too thought
I had found. that night

I saw it. I was sure. the light
behind the pain. fireworks

behind closed eyelids.
ready to chase it all down

the rabbit hole. I was
already falling: Wonderland

wondering, wandering lost.
but no. it was just -

just a wet puddle
on impassive bitumen.

just a mirage. a trick
of the light.

whose light? I suppose
it was nothing, just

something very
ordinary

after all.

To leave my glassy shell
And wander ‘twixt the verdant hills
Only to gaze at the industrial city as it spills.
Over this once quiet landscape,
Now choked with bitumen black roads and luminous eyes which keep vigils and forebode.
The skies licked by sound and smoke
Staring down at the shuffle of ill-proportioned buildings amidst a sea of compounding unknown things.
To walk down the narrowing alleys and breathe and smell the stagnant vapour;
Watching the walls crumple like old letter paper.
The street lamps like black spears; upright and joyless.
With lights that cast shadows like dancing daemons
Disappearing at the sight of the early mornings;
Dawn. This has always been and always will be.

We counted seventeen that morning,
driving in circles around Greenbelt Park.
Biding time before preschool drop-off,
we moved in measured paces beneath
a verdant canopy of oak and Virginia pine,
crossing diminutive rivulets repeatedly,
revisiting the same downed tree limbs
and tired park signs, disappearing and
reappearing in mist, our languorous
revolutions seemingly interminable,
each lap lost behind our slipstream.

It was a game we played together,
my daughter and I, circumnavigating
that slight road and counting the deer.
We tallied the bucks, does, and fawns
in plain sight, either ignorant or bold.
Vigilant, we watched for minuscule
movements beyond the windshield,
subtle stirrings in the understory:
a foreleg caught in a confusion of ferns;
a white tail, brazen, above the blueberries
or hovering, a clump of cotton atop holly;
caramel eyes cupped in mountain laurel—
ephemeral proof, woodland intimations.

Most days, we saw nothing
but familiar creatures as we
circled, spinning our wheels.
If we parked on the shoulder,
the black ribbon of bitumen
seemed to move beneath us still,
a vinyl track playing under tires,
daughter and I locked in place—
two diamonds at the tip of a needle,
skipping across prosaic grooves.

But the morning of the seventeen!
The moon hung dilatory in the sky,
a winking crescent eye, opaline.
And with each loop, the number grew.

-------------------------------------

Two years later, I circle back,
my daughter and I walking
toward a black fishing pier,
gulls etching invisible lines
into an aquamarine sky.

I ask her if she remembers
those rides before preschool,
if she remembers the morning
we saw those seventeen deer.
We pause, waves washing
white sea foam over our feet.  
She looks beyond the breakers,
taking in the horizon’s hard line,
a crisp indigo seam that appears
to stitch the round world straight.
One hand rests on her bony hip;
the other grips a shell-filled pail.
She turns, sizing me up with the
cold skepticism of a six year old,
and shakes her head in disbelief.
She tells me I’ve got it all wrong:
It couldn’t have been that many.

I’m tempted to argue. Instead,
I ask her, why does that number
(seventeen!) seem too high.

She looks at me, incredulous.
What am I trying to prove?
She speaks in small measures,
makes herself perfectly clear:

We were driving
in circles, Daddy,
and the deer,
the deer,
they move.

At once the horizon bends,
azure arc in space and time;
gulls stall in midair, snapshots
above suspended breakers. Silence.
Suddenly I’m back in Greenbelt Park,
treading nimbly, veiled by ivy screens,
leaping broken dogwoods cantilevered
over precious shallow streams,
muscles, ears, and eyes electrified.
I see as the unseen eighteenth deer
would have seen us—two creatures
harnessed in a restless death machine,
recumbent gods marking territory.

Around again. Wait.
Another close orbit.
Scrutinize red taillights
fading to distance and
then explode, vaulting
across alien asphalt,
hard halo of misery:
unnumbered,
exalted,
infinite.

1.
the wind is prone to grand festival
if you cook your own food
by burning your hands
in the day time
at night
then you will be also eligible
for having a ticket  
this train will not stop at any station
then how would you get on board
why
then do jump in front of the wheel
the door gets open automatically
you would also be a companion
of that joy
your name will also come up
on the list of the blood donors
with blood there will also hang
pus and spew
the colonialists
with a black face
will wind up their indigo-factories
in the fire of the intellect
the undergarment will burn
there will come running
bolder and bitumen
the road is made
your lipstick will be
sometimes deep
sometimes light
tearing open the yellow afternoon
a storm will take birth
there will be no darkness
in the amloki-grove  

2.
the ship is scheduled to start
from jetty no 3
i come to stand on
platform no 13
when i get on board the carriage
standing near
it takes me and runs to a vast
run-way
there are the lines of
sweet briar
i do not feel the pain of detaching
from the soil
when i  am flying
through the smoothness of the lotus-leaf
i see a musk-deer was also running
in a parallel line
she stretches her hand
to take me
to the valley of her flesh
we are turning round and round
to enter into a volcano
and  the flow of its eruption
is carrying us towards a ever-snow land

Swimmers under sandstone overhangs
Pink tree of flowers a sculpture
Blazing in a summer extending
Into the next season.

Concrete another blue to the horizon
Icons accumulated across the harbour
Mansion upon edifice, street after avenue
Walkers approach in droves raising dollars.

Children splash throwing soft missiles
No particular target.
At the head of the bay low tide
Reveals ***** scurrying this way and that.

Climbing hills of leadlights, bricks and money
Worlds away yet just beside
Walls in which many inhabit
Accounts of monumental difference.

Waters lap & lick at rocks
Ragged shells of oysters cracked
Joggers pound the bitumen
Lines of rare ants travelling.

Columbia (Robert N, RN, equal to 124 cf.,
a pair of gods, or equal to 124 a pair,
a pair of CFT 151 151 151 151 151 151 124 CFT
Denmark FTV, Willow Lira MIG, Columbus 1                           (Body Court)
and (3) 100 * 3000 3000.1000, volume,
Volume 2) Local 1010-1000) 50 1500
2501 2000 2000 2000 500 kg always 2-2105
Bongo two holes. Galakes (100)
1500 Israel, Australia Cliff Richard (2000),
(Two years ago) 215 2000-3 Thailand - (50) 500
Atlas Marukuro 500 Arcs 1500 (6) c)
Columbus, Amazon, Asian *** grabber 3000
Thomas Arthur, Arthur;                       APHAMSIATI 3000 Russian drivers
2 microfiber glass 22g) Zebrafish DNA.                                  505 horsefish
10:00, 10 January 2000, Austria,
January 2000 CMR 350-2000; (Research)
Development in Latin America)
rapid representatives in London
2 Amazon Belize LSBOS
3505 g (2), SGL (500) and Imitation I.EP
Tims Chrome. 124, E, H, 1000 GMT;
1 Denmark (FIFA) 100 3000 3000 2501
2. The Iranian 2/2000 2000 2000;
What happened in Africa, Jeremy
Sôasôa three hands, 2105 (7)
There is nothing to them,              the events of 16 100.600.3000.3000 km2,
July 6th. Test Israel (game) (600 Israel)
1500-1500, flavor and punch,     (2500)
1000 1500. or 2000 215 Juan Luna
3-6 February; 1000 Columbia City
50 in the city, Arthur's Door Press, 3000
Sons, Iva relay weekend - 2 HPP
Istarumque's diameter of Huntersville;
1000.505 500 meters. 1) 1000
2 to Hawaii, carrots, 2, x, x, 1000
2000 2 105 501 2 1500-2000 Company
Japan, especially at a time t
1, 1.1 1000 100 3000 3000 2100 Good
Nundy Ruhora Nundy it;
Galakes (100) What bitumen-1500 bhyulul
                                                hosa
The waters Remusaāsṭrēliyākusan
vatsarālakāryakramaṁ.  Yokka Adhilibhag
receives. The only beautiful and famous
Bongo redamariaitarulaparimāṇaṁfair
(2) kolambiyā (10M, sugar - 1000) 50
1500 2501 2000 taip 2000-2000.   Richard
Riding (2000), 2000-2005 - 50;
1500 · 1 000 50 500 0 - Tur (i)  - Columbus,
Arthaus: 3000 article Thamas Arthausraṣyan
(22) 500 3000 Maikro Aiphati FM (2500)
Janavari (2) the DNA cavalry Notropls Mariya
1000 (Glamula)) 2) Zebrafish DNA zebrafish;                                 Mariya
1000 Mariya;                                                 A HARM Krister Yokka Kirti.
(2) 1000 due car zebrafish fish;
The seas AHARM Krister Yokka Kirti.       Gaṇṭalu
àsṭriyāgba (505) sanvatsarāluPADI. Cicero Oberlln
Espinai field 2) or G 3AmejānL
Netherlands 505 (100) 1 (FIFA) 3000 3000 2501
2100 2000 2000 250 Abary bed-F;
February 2000 today? (100) - 1 (Scotty)
Outputs 2-16 100,3000,3000 Mariyamariya
500,000 kilometers.                                             This is one of the names -
Two, try Mary, 2105, Jamie
Sosa. 2. little thin (100) less than the (100) -.
Until late 1500 to begin
Light 00-2 Lal. Glass (2500) [          ] Gold Key moon -
3 1000 2 2000 500 215 1500 - 50 written observations
San Kaan Haar Sanbazaru am (Nadivaṇṭidi)
Arthur Ramat 1000.500.505 Mary anulu
expensive. 1) 1000: Phalitālu x 2 x Havay
2000 2000 2000 2000 1500 10 2 2 ™ Panṣaga
(2501) · edition, John March 3000
Marcus HPP grāmuluJong, 105Nippon
wahimi tsuohoji shiteita, Hungarian Kampf
Black happy Osaka 1) 3000-3000 (1)
It is important to understand that
People understand. 100.2 to 1000 -
500 kg, the cheese, WA Bongo cast into the oven,              which is purified
(2) Koronbia (10M, Sato - 1000) 50 1500
2501 2000 2000 2000 Type 2-2105 Garacus
(100) Joan, 1500 - The carpet ostatora
2 2 ™ solution is the solution riawa.
Chīfurichādo (2000) 215 2000 - Thailand
3 - Luna 50, 500 - 500 - 500 Marukukaro;
(6) (c) Columbus, Amazon ASINING
Asa Yorubā3000screen 3000 Phatr
Russian FM 50-2 0 2 _ Music
It is not for a long time IEP Tim. 124, E, H, 1000 GMT
1 Denmark (FIFA) 100 3000 3000 2501
2000 2000 2/20 hospitals   (see rn N stores gods cfr. equal to the gods, gods enemy of Clitractus 151, 151, WA 151;
151 100 151 151 124 if you have a CFT
cassettes, and Political Economy) denkku FTV,
Riras Yanagi MIG, Korona Basu 1 (Shoku
Yoyu) oyobi (3) 100 1000 * 3000 3000;
Glass 2) What is ice Bongo 1010-nen
Sato Saishu WA - 1000) 50 1500 2501
Hens 2000 2 Mac 2000-500 (2000-nen)) 215
2000 - 3-500 Atorasuāchi March Marrorough
1500, 500. 50. (6) - 100 Amazon Koronbasu
St. Thomas & Asia, Asia 3000, 3000 Gurabo
Roshi FM: 22 hectares of Oka team 2)
The fisherman said, Glory 1 505 1000 2000-nen
Nicholls Tsuki 10-2000 ututoria;           350 goat
2000 NSU Tsuki 1, fast Rondon Berizo
RMC can sing (US Kenkyu Kaihatsu
United States). Amazon is engaged
Therefore, March 2 505 G (2), SGL
(500) WA futuristsu or arimasen
The Iriist ISTrial. 124, E, H, 1000 GMT
1 kg (FIFA):  100 3000 5000 25012000
2000 bun'no 2-2 Shinpo, Iran, South
Africa here? Mary 2105 baishunpu
         Jeremiah Shasha                  Buzoku system of philosophy (7) U-2
100, 600, 3000, 3000 Kiro 16.07 Yuwaku
Mark hockey and Maalox Issura (a)
6, Socrates or a bird, and North Florida (600) 1500-1550 -6 broken, but overall ... Robert Columbia responded to CLI (DNS, RN, clinique equal to the CLI itself, CLI equal footing CFT 124 and 124 will be equal to the gods, and CFT 151 151 pairs 151 151 151 151 124 CFT Denmark FTV, Willow Lira MIG, kolomibiši 1 (P / home)
And (3) 100 * 3000 3000.1000, magnifying
Volume 2 (1010-1000 local) 50 1500
2-2105Bongo always have two corners. Callus (100)
1500 Israel, Australia Passage kilidi Richard (2000)
(Two years ago) 215 2000-3 Thailand - (50) 500
Atlas stars merukuro 500 1500 (6) c)
Columbus, Amazon, Asian Survey 3000 āšišiteni
MSI MSI ATI Thomas āritēri 3000 APHA driver skill reshiyenye
2 glass microfiber 22G) Zebrafish DNA zibe fishi horse shot 505
January 10 to 10, 2000, Austria,
January 2000 CMR 350-2000 (search)
And an increase in Latin America)
Quick representative in London London
2 Amazon Belize LSBOS
3505 kg (2), SGL (500,) and IES Asia
Chrome times. 124, E, H, 1000 km
1 Denmark (Unknown) 100 3000 3000 2501
2. Iranian 2/2000 2000 2000 e-mail:
Africa, and, what is that to me, Philip?
Šošošo three hands, 2105 (7)
That the only thing that is to say, it has the speed 100.600.3000.3000 16 km2,                |                                            ­        and have much the same,
                        July 6 (Game) 600 check Israel)
1500-1500, tasteless and Punched                     |(2500)
1500 Juan Luna, or Columbia city
50 in the city, Arthur Teller Press, 3000
Birds, EVA relay at the end of the week - 2 HPP
Qatar Yehāniterišešivili išekemēli
1000.505 500 m. 1) 1000
2 to Hawaii, calcium carbonate, 2, Lord, Lord, 1000
The crowd Japan, especially in time T
11 The raspberry Nundy Nundy;
Galaxy (100) What is luhoše TURF t'imit'i -1500?
water remešetiriliyekišušeni
Vetišerelekiririkereme yokeke ādihāhāhāgi
He said. Only the beautiful and famous
Bongo rēyimeriyerech'eperimeniye'āyiferi
(2) kolambiyā (10 m, sugar - 1000) 50
Building of 2000-2000. Palestine
Work (2000), 2000-2005 - 50;
· 500 1500 50,000 50 1 0 - dered to Columbus;
Arthaus 3000 title Tamas convenient āri'āwizere
(22) 500 3000 mekero glorify FM (2500)
Jeverus (2) Zebrafish DNA cavalry seas navel
1000 (kwamemole)) 2) Zebrafish DNA: Yazidi honori
seas ārifepirimi Krister yokeke maria 1000 card.
(2) 1000 fish and sea fish.
Christ Gaal Andrew East Aham yokoke
àsṭriyāgba (505) sanvatsarāluPADI.       Cicero Oberlln
Field Espinai 2) or G 3AmejāLL
Netherlands 505 (100) 1 (O) 3000 3000 2501
2100 2000 2000 250 Abary bed-F.
February 2000 today? (100) 1 (Scotty)
Results 2-16 100.3000.3000 meriyemiriyeriye
This name is 500,000 km kemininyewi
The two, Mary, 2105, the price of Benjamin?
SoSe. 2. In a small (100) and lower (100) -.
Until the end of 1500 to begin
Light -2 00 | XII. Glasses (2500), Golden Key yesterday -
written notes, Marcus šebeberuru song san    (nedivenētini)
Arthur 1000.500.505 high to match the way you want them
Expense. 1) 1000: Phalitāl × 2 Havay
2000 2000 2000 2000 2000 10 2 2 ™ penishige
(2501) · Standard edition, John March 3000
Jan M. pi.pi ​​giremelu: 105 nopini
The camp was wahimi tsuohoji *****, a Hungarian,
Black is a welcome Osaka 1) 3000-3000 (1)
to add ipsum dolor sit amet
She protection. 100.2-1000 -
To 500 kg of cheese, WA Bongo is (2) Koronbia (10 m, Sato --1,000) was purified in the oven, 501, 500
2501 2000 2000 2000 Type 2-2105 Garacus
(100) John, 1500 - Carpets and ostata
2 2 Riawa solution.                     Chififuchido (2000) 215 2000 - Thailand
3 - Luna, 50, 500 - 500-500 Marukukaro
(6) c) Columbus, Banda Origin
ASA Yoruba3000screen 3000 Phatr
Russian FM 50-2 0 2 _ Music
IEP is not a long time, Tim. 124, E, H, 1000 km
1 Denmark (Unknown) 100 3000 3000 2501
2000 2000 2/20 hospitals (151 CF stores the DNA of the enemy, clitractus: 151, WA 151 View all other gods I
151 100 151 151 124 If you make money and terrorist funding
Barry Standard) ditirikiku FTV;
Riras MIG could not find Yanagi, Paso 1  (Shoku
Yoyu) oyobi (3) 100 1000 * 3000 3000
Lily lily 2) Snow-NEN 1010 Bongo What is this?
Saishu agency WA - 1000) 50 1500 2501
Chicken 2000 2 Mac 2000-500 (2000's))
2000 - 3-500 ātilešiše March Marrorough
1500, 500. 50. (6) 100 Amazon koribobešu
St. Thomas Asia 3000 3000 gurebo
A. F. Petra Antiqua 22 hectares of Group 2)
1-NEN 2000 1000 505 Fisherman
Nikolizikiki 10-2000 āwito'ātire 350 stuff;
1-2000 juniši Sook, Ron quickly Berizo
Āri.ēmi.ēni. Song (Kenkyu Kaihatsu United States)
United States). Amazon is
Therefore, on March 2, 505 G (2), SGL
(500) W or āwirešiti šurišitušu ārimišeni
Āyiriti itirireli 124 EH, 1000 km
1 kg (Unknown) 3000 100 (5) 25012000
2-2 shinipo brown 2000, South IRENINA
Africa here? Mary bešechufu 2105
Jeremiah fled Buzuku highway system (7) and -2
100, 600, 3000, 3000 Krogh 16.07 yuweku
Marc hockey and Malcolm bundles (a)
6, birds and šok'iret'išitochi North Florida
(600) -6 rest of 1500-1550, almost ...

I’d never felt comfortable in that house
Not once, since we’d moved on in,
A rambling, derelict, barn of a house,
Three storeys of age-old sin.
Nobody said there’d been murders there,
Or told of the gypsy’s curse,
Three hundred years of discarded junk
And I don’t know which was worse.

The air was dank, and creepy and cold
So I opened the windows wide,
Trying to get some airflow through
To clear the smell inside.
It was musty, dusty, smelt like a tomb
With a corpse, decayed and grey,
We cleaned and scrubbed it room by room
And the smell went slowly away.

We tackled the ground floor first, we thought
We could leave upstairs til last,
The stairs were blocked with a French chaise longue
From some distant time in the past,
It was jammed hard up by the bannister rails
So it wouldn’t go up or down,
I said I’d have to pull it apart
And that sparked a Hartley frown.

Hartley was the love of my life
Who tackled that house as well,
She said it was a pig in a poke
That its real name was ‘Hell!’
But we finally cleared a space to live
And she worked out a way to shift
That French chaise longue from the stairway by
Trying a twist and lift.

The second floor was a nice surprise
There was none of the junk and grime,
The bedrooms still remained as they’d been
Laid out in another time,
So Hartley dealt with the dust in there
While I went up for a look,
The room above was an attic room
And that’s where I saw the book.

It lay on a dusty table with
Its pages ragged and torn,
The paper a sort of parchment and
The ink, quite faded and brown.
The cover was ancient leather, cracked
And worn, as if by an age,
‘The Many Lyves of this House’ it had
Embossed, as a title page.

I cautiously opened the cover, read
The words on the parchment page,
The light in the room then turned to gloom
And a storm began to rage.
I raced on down to the ground to find
A man outside, who said,
‘For those inside, don’t seek to hide,
I say, bring out your dead!’

And a cart stood out in the street outside
A pile of the dead in place,
The street was cobbled, not like before,
But of bitumen, no trace.
And on my door was a huge red cross
With a white and painted scrawl,
‘God, have mercy on us,’ it read,
‘Have mercy on us all.’

And there on the floor, inside the door
Was a corpse wrapped in a sheet,
I dragged it out by the feet, no doubt,
And I left it in the street.
On climbing back to the topmost floor
I leapt and pounced on the book,
But the page had turned, and the fire burned
Before I had time to look.

London burned in the distance and
Lit up the night like day,
I didn’t know of it then, but it
Was burning the plague away,
And every page in that cursèd book
Brought a different time to bear,
‘The Many Lyves’ that this house had lived
Were all inscribed in there.

I slammed that leather cover shut
And I laid it on its face,
Then swore that I’d never open it
While the Lord would lend me grace.
And Hartley, dragged from her cleaning chores
She never could understand,
Why I put a torch to that ancient house
And burnt it to the ground.

David Lewis Paget

‘I’d swear that the sun is hotter,’ she said,
‘It’s hotter than I can recall,
The garden’s turned into a desert, is dead
My plants are fried up to the wall.’
I said I agreed, the car was so hot
I often got scorched by the steel,
The belt with the buckle was always red hot
And so was the steering wheel.

I said you could tell by the state of the road
Could tell by the bitumen melt,
The surface was shiny with liquefied tar
The heat off the surface you felt.
Beyond was the countryside, brown and bereft
Not a single green shoot could you see,
The bushes were brown from the top to the ground
And there wasn’t a leaf on a tree.

‘The place is like tinder, it just needs a spark
And it all will go up with a roar,’
We couldn’t survive in the smoke from the park,
We would have to be gone, well before.
I told Desdemona to pack us a case,
Just those things we would need on the run,
Some food and some water, a doll for our daughter,
Remember to pack us a gun.

We took it in turns to keep watch through the night,
To listen to every slight breeze,
The heat was intense, we looked over the fence
For any strange light through the trees,
It came from the valley, that terrible roar
So we knew that the demon was out,
Some one lit a spark way down in the park
And Des raised the house with a shout.

The three of us piled in the four wheel drive
And headed up over the hill,
The terror of flames in the rear view mirror
Have plagued and have haunted me still.
The wind had been gusting and fanning the flames
Pursuing us on our retreat,
Had crept up beside us and threatened to ride
Ahead to our certain defeat.

The heat so intense it had cracked the screen
And blistered the paint on the door,
When Desdemona let out a scream
To point to the gun on the floor.
‘Is this why you asked me to pack the gun,
Is it either that, or burn?’
I’d not meet her eyes with a tissue of lies
So I masked my own concern.

I heard her pray as the tyres caught fire
And exploded, one by one,
I kept the pedal flat to the floor,
It was either that, or the gun.
Then out of the darkness loomed a lake,
It was water up to the doors,
We came to rest where the water blessed
With the fire held back by the shores.

The skies were grey and they opened up
With God’s good grace at the dawn,
I held my wife and my daughter close
As the rain made us feel reborn,
When the people tell me there is no God
I just smile, and I let them go,
If he isn’t there then I find it odd
That he sent the rain…  I know!

David Lewis Paget

We’ve navigated the old canals
Since the roads were blocked with cars,
And we were stuck when the highway truck
Rolled over the top of ours,
They poured a layer of bitumen
Across the roofs of them all,
Then crushed them under a steam roller
Until they were flat, and small.

They didn’t bother to pull them out
The ones who were trapped inside,
Just wrote them off the accounting books
And made a note that they’d died,
They needed to halve the ones who lived
Or the earth would sputter in space,
Spinning across that great divide
With the death of the human race.

But we got out, and we made a break
For the fields and the old canals,
And found a deserted barge afloat
Thanks to the help of pals,
We got some paint and we cleaned it up,
Made it all right to roam,
Then once inside it was quite a ride
And started to feel like home.

Most of the waterways were clear
With some of them overgrown,
I’d send Gwen Darling back to the rear
To steer while the weeds were mown,
I’d scythe them out of the way ahead
And steer the barge through the gap,
Then rest at night by a harvest moon
With Darling Gwen on my lap.

I’d bag a hare on a winter’s night
And steal the milk from a cow,
The earth was dying, but we survived
And Gwen kept asking me how?
‘We’re going back to the way it was
Before computers and such,
Before the Banks had us by the throat
When love was lived by a touch.’

So still we wander across the land
As they did in the days of old,
Those ancient barges, covered in dust
But laden, carrying coal,
There’s a merry fire on a metal hearth
And an oven, full of a goose,
And a woman’s wiles, to gladden my heart
As her stays are coming loose.

David Lewis Paget

°

When we look not with our eyes 
convince ourselves of impossibilities-

typical gravel turns into motorways 
without tyres, we saw ourselves as cars 

eyes glazed, paved speed of reckoning 
just as rubber tearing at bitumen
 
convinced we will get to there
[that isn't here]
at trip's end, we find ourselves a typical mob 

typical gravel looks like typical gravel 
as we stoop out of that beat-up ute 

our eye catches the side-mirror 
stymied by our shoes that crunch 

making familiar sounds on familiar gravel



_ __ ✒
●○
°

Look, grand pa, that yoostbe a mega mall.


At the edge of paradise, just there, where those sunflowers,
and mustards are making little canyons for trickles
to form rills and eventually, streams to carry away
all that water can dissolve, though, if I
fret I can
wonder at where the asphalt pitch will be,
it being hydrophobic,
insoluble unless we get some more acid rain,
-- yeah, that might work
over time.
the tower in Babel was mortared with bitumen,
what did the destruction of that edifice of mud pollute?

Nevermind, all the empty malls shall make fine villages,
and where the parking lot was,
there will be a meadow of the sort seen where green
is given back
hope, wait… do you imagine
the earth can groan?
do green things hope? do they grow happy or are they
statelessly happening,
verily being  the hypostatic form of
homeostasis in
the pursuit of life for life's sake, slightly weighted toward
happy state expecting
good, so for common sense,
we use the colors common to life's attractors
green means go
red is stop…
straight edges, where nothing grows,
those say stop, look and listen
?
we all know the warning signs, or do we get those in lessons
along the way,
along the way of course, I knew,
I was testing you.

once the course is mapped though, then we must learn the way,
before we may go outside and play,

that was different when I was a child, then
I thought readily as a child, with no need of grand kids
to remind me,
this is 2020, but some things never change.

The boy who hangs his story from the bridge.
As if by fairy tale told minutely to a desperate lover.
Her tormented eyes
picturing this broken neck;
his story told in the lingering art of death.  Or

he who faces the train to Ferny Hills
and each commuter who remembers
that day’s monotony as bits of him
slapped against a carriage like
someone throwing wet fish.  Or

the pass-over traffic
grumbling at the fall of tragic demonstration - a
boy not welcomed anywhere except by the earth
that took him in with a kiss of bitumen.  Or

balanced on needle point, a
thousand thousand weights pressing death
into an arm embracing the TV-cable guide and
a torn photograph of Jennifer the mud wrestler.
And all this waste
sending little statistic waves of shock that don't anymore.

Gone to sleep like the boys who left us.
Early sleep. Early rise and forget the
sons who disappear in a magician’s finale.
The cloak of social history that accepts this.
The magic
abracadabra of disturbed unhappy youth.

We swirl like the dragons
Free from dungeons and darkness
In eternal salvation like salamanders
Although we aren't lizards hanging from trees
Hung up on life and disease
Breathing the air of autumn leaves
Dancing with the breeze, and ceasing to exist
Sending you our energies in the form of soft lullabies
If you can add to the good, you can keep away the evil
You can bring peace to yourself, and others in desperate need of quiet
You can be free from the peace of mind
Understand freedom in a nutshell, hanging like frescoed paintings
On top of a shelf of porridge and crimson red cherries, pears tresses
The parchment of each other, writing well within the textual framework of partridges in a pear tree
We can pray together, or remain silent forever
In vow of silence, and make lonesome Lumos shine bright like the kites running after in eros
Of the atmosphere, silenced forever, we sing lullabies for the ones to hear in their peace
A man with a peace of mind can understand silence and hold his tongue in the palm of murmurs
The sound swirls through the dungeon-like darkness, hunger for a touch of soil in the cold icy winters
We moon over these things, and it dawned on me that silence can last forever
And it isn't always good or bad
Sometimes it is evil to press and good to release yourself
Expand your mind, and be shapeless like water crashing against troughs flowing streams of fruit
Rivers could ripen, feel the song yonder deepen your soul
We wash these tears, from the eyes of agreeable people and disagreements come to me in a dream
These dreams are made of arguments and debates, I reason with myself unable to ever wake up in the morning
Howl from the depths of hell, and arrive on thin lands watching us with thin eyes like mirrors on cars, add what is specifically your own
Arrive in heaven, better to reign in hell
I'm lost in paradise on this ruin of thy moon and stars
Looking away from the fingers pointing at me like apples and bumps
Words are for the lugging carriage, to carry out their travels in their worlds from battered broken places
Wry comments from the crowd, and some cages of parakeets singing in kisses
Snakes in the grains of rice, stopping us from hissing from our caregivers and calling them unforgiving
Without food, I do not think I could live on
Without a mirror, I do not think I could live ignorantly with this hubris
Ran from the house at the age, I don't think I could live in such a cold climate
Raising my glass to my birthday invitees, they look at me blowing the birthday candles out, I'm in the seventh circle of Hell
Knells and bell tolls, ceramic steel galoshes, bitumen, and hydrophobic gum puts these dharma bums chewing grass together in apple streets full of cosmic debris
That look young and pretty, and pestering me with a limerick for some hypnosis and mirages in this solipsism
Aging like a dragon that used to burn out the flame of Hell, saving the morning again and again

If you're so cosmic, why don't you explain life to us from the Beezlebub spell, little dragon