Wednesday, February 28, 2018

Rob Schackne #601 - "No hard food, says my Indian dentist"


No hard food, says my Indian dentist

I'm a bit out of it in the chair, I ask
She says no hard candies or bones
I mean no mints, table legs, laptops

Moon shoots, bar fights, or regret
No new liberties, grand failures, politics
Marathon boots, or downhill climbs
None of that is good for your old teeth
Poetry she says is OK (maybe Rumi)

Best eating pudding with soft berries
Soups, salads, the meat without trouble
Fruit juice, bug juice, juice of other planets
Good work, old work, the way of the bee

Noodles, rices, friendship, sweet goodbyes
I want them to last you all your life.


Kerri Shying R # 420 - Hobbledehoi


Hobbledehoi

it helps me teach   anything 
when I stumble   on a line   of ink
my thumb intruding in the charcoal
the sadness   our lady of the screwed
intention   how

does the butterfly   get the wing
to glow    why the sun-strike glares
until small flies   buzz like the bubbles
in a soda pop   right inside my eye
the inkling blackness

sucking   in three D 
someone  won’t you tell me

Kit Kelen #789 - this is where I never grew up (a note for my archaeologists)


789
this is where I never grew up
(a note for my archaeologists)


a rattle past of road
and there's the future mist

cow lowed
I went under the radar here

these few chords for amazement
succeeding as we come to our time
which seems on occasion to be a place

it was purchased for the purpose
I meant to wreck their business model
by being the hidden treasure
I was!

flit from dark dreaming
to what the sun's lit

yes all around it spoke
there was holy water
and the garden grew

empire of me on tip toes too

this has to be where the penny dropped
I pulled the wool over my very own eyes
and everyone else's
got lost in the piano here
and made myself event

I stretched to fit
and covered every surface
and even where I couldn't play

a scholar of my scratchy desk
an astronaut of nights
I could be anything
(boys always could)

was toasted under tin
and oft in effigy to burn
I made my own anathema thus
welcome to my Ark
or perhaps you'd say pyramid?

it must be here I landed

various parts come bring

they said the umbrella tree would tear up the slab
how tall and true all stories are
mixed flora in the cracks below

a lucky thing it all was
I've thought to call it 'parrot's dice'

yes I come down in the last shower
and shake a leg to start

the day was always bright eyes
and the night was always young

redistribution!
made rough justice here
though we won't mourn what's said

I had my head screwed on all this while
the things I've not yet tried are too scary

coming and going then one day I stuck
'it wouldn't work', they told me

tooth and claw some certain seasons
best of all I fooled myself
I could never add up and away

under the flesh I was down to the bone
still I kept my shirt on

and here's the seventh city
and the dust of it shook off

grandeur in the handspan, wings
anything you can dream upon

here's the fountain
you have to only sip from the cup

youth's patina applies

it was here I found out
my wallaby nature
and took things on the bounce

this is where schemes came to grief
and I must have been hatched

it's all proverbial in these parts
and quite a bit of the biblical knowledge
as in the spirit of creation
ironized as in due course

I keep the hemlock beaker here
just in case of coups

yes you can say it's half full

this is the place!
dig here!

Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Rob Schackne #600 - "The cockatoos"


Image result for Tibetan thangka

        The cockatoos
        remind me
        skull & bones
        around my neck
        all weight
        ring the bells
        & prayer wheel
        death mask
        all weight
        trace a path
        my thangka
        all weight
        leave it there
        only this
        is reasonable
        scream the birds


Rob Schackne #599 - "Wipe my tears"


Wipe my tears
say it's raining
wash my body
creek beds filling
open a window
the wind is strong
help me to sit up
we all need shelter
boil me an egg
it’s still summer


Kerri Shying R # 421 - Adrenals


Adrenals

activate   two small glands
they   snug by flush red
kidneys been there done that
but not without a hand  no
not for a long time   this

tighrope flat against the ground
my feet   toe-out  in tabi
find every inch   by memory
here the fear   of eyes
shocked with flared up

pain  tiny vessels  swollen
how do they all communicate
without me   in the absence
of danger  running drills
I hear the bells sing out 

hope without
the juice  you hear


Kit Kelen #788 - everybody came in



788
everybody came in

out of the rain

all misted down
the out-there
dark of a window won

cows stood round of course
complaining

music sat in a chair
kicked back
and I could hear the creek

fur came
whiskers, wings
and more legs
the ponderous and the posers

ideas abandoned
and an outer world
to flicker in the cave

insectivorous
verandaration

all awash
we were trying out for an Ark

all suitcases and relatives
hopes of a place in the sun

each of them wanting a name
they came with the skills of another place

all of us under glass

ran round till naked
it was summer still
but you could see out

we had parlour games --
chase the spider
poison rat
spray the yet-to-name

what sports!
they'd play along
and gasp their last

and after
o such happy trees

all of us looking up
to the business blue
of a sky for these parts

then
run so the rain won't catch you
sweep it out the door

sing where the sun even now stands waiting
just to be shone some more

Monday, February 26, 2018

Rob Schackne #598 - Backtracks (redux)

Backtracks


                   I met myself in a dream
                   and I just want to tell you
                   everything was alright    
(Lou Reed)



Four months later
below the snake-line
everything is not alright
I look each way
dangerous & foolish
what an imposter
I cross the street
the people he dreams
duck into a shadow
I'm barely recognized

Kerri Shying R # 420 Prednisolone taper

Prednisolone taper

no thrill   this   steroid reduction   got up at 6.30    made a good brekkie    took the pills    did some housework crumpled   like the forepetals of the jonquil across the bed    at some stage the animals crept along and warmed me    I heard the phone ring    off in the lounge    this made me recall the stage set of the play Boing Boing    thoughts of my tasks    for the day   began to enter and leave my brain    through revolving doors   I went along behind them sweeping   a small broom made of rushes    useless    in the rain

Kit Kelen #787 - the gamble


787
the gamble 
 

see it fall to ruins
just the weather let in

voices come to me through it
in a steady-on of rain
time not telling there

PAST ARRESTED IN PYRAMID SLAVE CRIME
OTHERS' LANDS & GOODS UNJUSTLY SEIZED

and nevertheless an idea at the time
and lived to
speak the grievance

I'm building it all to wash away
I'm building it all to burn

till I'm the one in the far far
and better
then was atavist
a neck behind and get it in

so swim through the weather
swim through the drought
condemned to days

my tribe escaped to this
time not telling

play hard to get and you're gone

Sunday, February 25, 2018

Kerri Shying R # 419 - Sundays


Sundays

unpacked birthdays    fabric
strewn  the passions
of the past  unboxed
made ready for the march     on
new floors   I see the ways

the joins fall   this
most malleable
 of days  I ride
 the sawhorse
 of  the future   off

where of all this   is made
anew  

Sunday   raw  elements
fan out   see carousels
revolve

Rob Schackne #597 - "there's so much"



there's so much

in the wind

where sound goes

in the wind

but my friend

believes all poetry

aspires to silence



Kit Kelen #786 - nobody knows the moment we're in


786
nobody knows the moment we're in


all a hunch at having come
and even if we say 'we're here'
that hardly constitutes a claim
being just because

in a stillness set
and you see what stirs
blink

how is the plumbing in the tree?

the past like a puppy
and we're the stick fetched

calendar winks
over at

music is listening for us here
futures come when we call
someone sings

the weather for us, just for instance
this island twangle

diaries piled in a drawer
years before I was up for it
now blank, not even printed
years beyond me yet

it's gathered scraps by which we guess
must have somehow blown this far

a clock is always calling
radio speaks puzzles

the becoming of us
none of us ever lived for this

one day the drugs give up on you

nobody lives here really
but it's hard to get away

in a stillness set to go
we've come to know
what's next

Kristen de Kline #178 The sun

here it comes, the
sun     it feels like years
since you've been gone
on the last mile home
I carried it     close:
your     heart
everything
seemed possible
then

I wake to the sound
of cockatoos screeching
     you leaving
a burning coconut and elderflower candle
slowly melting     like ice
the emergency crews
scrambling on ladders
rigging up power lines

the highway
breathes

you leave

the ice
slowly melts
out the back of Lawless
I think   
I  can touch the sun

you say:
do you want to run away to Norway?

years     it feels like     years

everything: the sun, your heart, the ice
I don't know what the fuck I'm saying






Saturday, February 24, 2018

Kerri Shying R # 418 young men, again


young men, again

you have me   smile
 your warm
 butter smile   follow
 about the pharmacy

he’s a chatterbox   all six four
a hundred kilos   an open paddock
of a face   tells me how he took his mates
to tapas  for the first time
and they rise up

coming through the screen doors
in cricket pads

these giants faces  
how they fell   even in that
 buzz box   excitement
the platters   bite sizes
 odd number appetisers  

aching on politeness
  smart casual
the unbumbled manhood

me too much
 the kindly old woman he knows
 to talk to    to say
  oh love
did you stop
did you get something
to eat 
on the way home

we sniffed
 the beard soap
while I waited for my script
he told me
how      maybe
the woman      she
likes the smell her man has

maybe

Rob Schackne #596 - A Day

A Day


Local churches     pray for rain
forecast today     rain     no rain
a glorious sunset     lively chat
about her faith     some dinner

her recent degree     theology
some Handel     a little MJQ
the piece is     A Social Call
real time     a hand of faith

the many callings     we missed
some Led Zeppelin     summer
won't leave     still we ramble


Kit Kelen #785 - birthday pieces - studio warming piece


785
two birthday pieces

1
soon we'll be fishing from the veranda

studio warming piece



the longer the nest to make
the lovelier the egg


this is the moment
all perfect now
ready to begin

if there is a world
it stopped
well before here

somewhere in the garden
we filtered out the dust

people say it's revving up
but this is where the bucked stopped
till you squeezed it out some more
all of this to banish the frantic

stood in a paddock
commanded this rise

... delayed reaction


then everyone came
it was a party
how the walls went up!

it took a lot of coaxing
miracles take work
but see how the breeze is
because of veranda

everyone says you could live in it

the Taj Mahal has no such pond
Ben Hur may be big
but this box is yours
you built it
herded the cats in a frenzy

this is where to go wild

all the colours are from day
and the dark is sunlit still

the bush is guard to this
the valley opening to view
sun powers it
breezes aboard
and from veranda
watch the pond

in ducks
and eels and water dragon
all lotus fronded, flowered
rose fingered for a first thing
pinking sunset too

here's

red bellied black
removes old frog from pond 
you witness this

and something you can never see

better than anything else
the place is blessed
with you

and all you have to do is

consider the everything to come
gets better and better
but now

be birthday girl
in the moment perfect
it doesn't come again





2
58


birthday cuddles
and birthday kiss
still in bed for birthday bliss

and best of all a birthday beam
when waking from your birthday dream

here's your birthday lie-in tea
brought to you by birthday me

birthday bird has come to sing
a birthday song to you

it's birthday up in the branches
and birthday here on Earth 

it's time to make the most of
so birthday for all your worth

then first thing up's a birthday stretch
prance about like a birthday fool
birthday yoga, birthday swim
sun yourself on birthday deck
plunge in birthday pool

and still it's yes a sunny one
so peg the birthday washing out
dries extra fast on a day like this
with added birthday clout

not that there's a word to say 
or need to lift a finger
not for this breeze in which we linger
it's birthday weather today

then present to present the day progresses
from birthday call to birthday call
and one forgets a whole year' stresses
all sorts of heckles begin to fall

till birthday snifter with the birthday bunch
birthday bubbly, birthday punch

and birthday rudeness on the cards
if we can fit it in
no matter what you will indulge
it's only birthday sin

but watch the birthday sweetmeats
or put on birthday girth

it's birthday up in the branches
and birthday still on Earth 

and Birthday 2 tomorrow
Birthday 3 the day after that
birthday after birthday
only need be said

it could go on forever like this
once the birthday poem's read

Rob Schackne #595 - "nothing doing" (after Bernard H)


nothing doing
at the hermitage

keith richards
full of honey
bhikkhu on drums
how do I sleep

when can I eat
this rain this music

all those bees
my condition
of the night
just sitting


Friday, February 23, 2018

Rob Schackne #594 - "Yes my word of the day"


Yes my word of the day
all I could do without
what was taken away


all I was asked to give
what you could remember
what I made a meal of

there won't be time
in this false economy

no one takes their time

the evening's spread
come watch us then
hooverized upon a table


Kit Kelen #784 - the novel

784
the novel 

 

some moment 
of high suspense
to begin

believe a sky
when falling

no one says but
you're in

and ride this wave
till the sea's across
till the river
runs us dry

Thursday, February 22, 2018

Rob Schackne #593 - Benthos-12

Benthos-12

This old pond

the sky changes
blue to deep purple
a second's grace
what displays
this conversation
about enlightenment
the cave as library
a world where books
are disappeared

everything dark
what goats do

Kit Kelen #783 - re-priming again

783
re-priming

for those who have gone under


you get ideas from what's down there

from the lost
from their having gone

and often about to kick off the scaffold

sometimes tiredeness overtakes
and all the years till now

there's always a ladder
up and in
corner with your initials engraved

while in their ooze you splash

then summer comes
fizzle among
and soggy if sky down

come on a tumbrel

not even in their prime yet
not yet fleshed
now under! now forever gone!

all of them were children
none could vote
all served

and traitors!
we carved them up
crows pecked the entrails

you can always work with a stain
scrape back

you need some depth to carve
some of these ideas could push up daisies
and burying's too good for some
so we dig 'em out to flog some more

many drowned in the last storm
some bobbed up
sprayed them down like bugs

or left to bake
with the ants crawl over
honey-coated
left to wash away

some rot
we lay to rest
we burn

each for example
and let that be lesson

but am I finished with them then?

every one was tricked to be
not one had a choice

yes I laughed demoniacally
evil if not genius

came at them with the chisel
came at them with the knife again

why should they survive, not me?

so various
the launch into eternity

think of the forgotten
deep pile and dusty
spiders' home

death to the dead!

and as to those fortunate still writhe
in possibility -
on all those who are about to salute me
I slap down the paint

amen
hooray

Kerri Shying R #417 - the ladies auxiliary


the ladies auxiliary

don’t school me    by the ankle socks
here       my chin whiskers   leaning in
for lopping   brushing on the peter pan
of the collar     much too more the dessert
woman   than a statement hair   this

tired old consciousness   the thing
is gunna lap me    all lined up 
on the top oval   like the start of that
fucking futile cross-country   it gave me
asthma    and it never did rate fitness

curriculum  stamped me
like a letter     return to sender  
so   here I am and
what you gunna do
with me  now eh

Wednesday, February 21, 2018

Kerri Shying R # 416 - gaolhouse for KZ


gaolhouse  for KZ

all flying kites
 hands out
 between the bars

no
 electron swipes    to beat
 on rainy days   my heart

the node of tumbled wire
 tap taps
plug me   life's a drain

I hear you      speak  in
 messages    HA

winnow off
 that husk go
slop it    to the pigs

feed me    real
you    to the tooth
whole grain

Rob Schackne #592 - "Hard at work your heart"


Hard at work your heart
that quickens more, stays
for last reel & credits
waits for the dim poet
the impossible question
is this my life the afternoon

my bus my walk my dinner
forget the cavemen go
the 9:49 rolling through

do I advance the subject
the windows need cleaning
this is my notebook and pen


Kristen de Kline #177 Melting

The ice is slowly
melting     your
heart,   I dropped it
on the last mile home
phone lines are down
don’t cut me loose 
a blackout in the Valley
hold me tighter
don’t listen
to a word
they say




Kit Kelen #782 - three poems - it's with the first thing birds / upon the place below / now my kingdom is complete


782
three poems

1
it's with the first thing birds
bearers of light

I become a more sensitive instrument

all twinge of
they tune the weather to me now

this music has a knowledge of us

I hear the day strike up


2
upon the place below

at long bloody last
chimes with a rhythm we call roof

this is the first time for the rain
when it was arriving I almost took a pill

it has to find a way to earth

it has to be a cloud first
congregation of vapours

all paws for it
I stand in socks at last to watch

chutes tangles and the targets off
they could be ours down there

a long imagination of wonders
that it could be so

sky pissed itself pure again

the first green thing is yet to shine
blind in hopes of up




3
now my kingdom is complete

and all unruly subject

built!
but have they come?

I am a pyramid
all tomb if done

all around me
far as eye can see

already the shine is coming off

all the faith glow of it goes

there's no one in charge here

Tuesday, February 20, 2018

Kerri Shying R #415 - Holler


Holler

let me lean back
   past the sway
rest the scrollings
 in the spine   sit
the bony mountain
 top to unmined base

 spread me out
beyond the lines   of fault  
 shout    a slim crevasse to
get a whisper back     you

 go away    no
such thing   as bottomless
 no pit   to drop that stone   lean
 into this   my hard-pegged
line    of most resistance
 gentlest smile

Rob Schackne #591 - "I don't know if"


I don't know if
it's a roundabout
or a face, a grace
that's missing

one coming
in safety first
a wide margin
of true beauty

those flowers
drums are beating
the roads know
closer to the day


Kit Kelen #781 - on the grandeur of delusions


781
on the grandeur of delusions


mine's
full bodied failure
the lifelong
all who
where we are

so much to
hunger at
defy

could be
dark of the season
and tribe too

he showed her his love
she lapped at that
with baton grip
hit for six
and ruck

in
of
up until

take it lying down
be blown

old sky beard
was with with us
thunder vaunt

in the mirror
I am

and stroke myself
half a chance
it's emperor to be

so preen we
sing ourselves together

because a war was
we are free

let me burn your village down
raze it
be enslaved

and otherwise unspeakable

make nation
golden as a cloud
sun struck
dissolved

we each as thin as air

make my t shirt
make it now
do it faroff
I won't look

as much as you like
no one will hear

out of time home found us

we sent the others off
let's huff

that's an immortality

come to my bones
believe me
let me be your shrine

the Bible caught the bullet
closest to the heart

good ache
I need a little dark with that

the ever after's gone

there is nowhere but here

let us depart in peace

Monday, February 19, 2018

Kit Kelen #780 - the Barnabeast or Mr Pizzle



780
the Barnabeast
or
Mr Pizzle
(a political poem)


a man is fulminating
is at the beer frothing

he is all in his hat
a big horizon

look at him boasting
modest and shy
(firm of country solicitors)

burns up the forest
runs the rivers dry

the future's all these ruins to Mr Pizzle
sees progress

poor diddims in his baby socks
and cannot even knit

stuck in his finger
and pulled out too late

o how I love a doom like this
and how it slowly comes