Saturday, August 31, 2019

Kit Kelen #1339 - I live in a country of boiling frogs


1339
I live in a country of boiling frogs


have you noticed how warm it’s getting?
thought not

land of, swamp, a pond was once

all on deckchairs sunning

around the world, this salt-rise
no good
it’s no good at all
can’t always hear the tide

time was a thing beating under the skin

ah lily pad, lotus
give me mosquitoes

nights by the pond almost dry
and some croak
‘where is the rain?’
but not all can remember

one old frog thinks
must have misplaced it

skin’s not as slimy as it once was

some say we should save ourselves
lots of frog laughter for that

I know how far I can throw my tongue

curve of the earth is nothing
we’re flat
I like a nice round sun

moon too
and all night singing
for love

but watch out!

snakes are fast too
and desert dry some

a big ugly toad loves warmer weather
some say coming for us too

but who knows?
we’ve not invented measurement
there’s no one here to trust

remember splash and frond leap?
back in the day, that was

hot under the collar
some say we could yet boil here
but they do nothing

nobody jumps
just because someone says

we live in a land of boiling frogs
one has to speak for them like this

can you see anything through this smoke?

imagine them, high up in towers
riding a graph
while everywhere a forest falls
and how did we get here?

unfair to them this picture is
frogs really aren’t much trouble

Friday, August 30, 2019

Rob Schackne #992 - A Poem to Billy Collins (for Lance Convey)

A Poem to Billy Collins

                                          for Lance Convey

If there was no poetry
there would be nothing
to write about, the world
would be so entangled
no witness to sameness
or beautiful difference
all points of wonder gone
my own days spent lost
and so too yours would be
music missing its colours
wind with no redeeming grace
the counsel of birds unheard

Jeffree Skewes #106 Don Coyote


Contrary to echoes 
the wolves never quite 
retreat, unlike the snowmen
pashers and cougars grow old







dignity albeit disheveled 
dimmed  and grey
our Don continued to rise 
early and rest late

each day to battle 
any path may lead astray
enamor Galicians
and the passion blows

every breath expropriated 
what amounts to a battle cry 
go on then take all these steps 
risk everything, dare, retreat





so to the mill and mules
Sancho at the very last  
second 
reaches out to catch 
our falling tree.

so tomorrow may come





image: The hand of Apollinaire (Apolony detail)  oil and acrylic paint on fabric / JMS 

Kit Kelen #1338 - the white van



1338
the white van

it was a rumour in the town to begin
you know how a rumour gets around
takes a while to get out to the blocks

the white van was there again yesterday
came into the driveway just a little
real enough
registered vehicle
though I didn’t catch the plates

not quite the kind kidnappers use on TV
relative of a sort

they were looking about, weren’t they?
or there might have only been one of them
I didn’t make out a face

leant out
had something in his hand
up near the gate
somehow threatening
nothing happened
but who knows what he was up to

you wouldn’t know these days
but well, I have my ideas

started as a rumour, yes
but I’m not the only one who’s seen it
everyone has

ice van some said
tales of girls boys ruined
plucked like flowers in their prime
left wilted
you see those blank faces all over town
you can only wonder

one worries one might be too quick to judge
cast the first stone and so on

but this van is real enough
right out of order

an innocent Captain Cook?
no, a reckie I reckon

evil flash
and then gone

drug courier maybe
or worse – Ivan Milat
the Belanglo van!

heathen thing
may lightning strike
probably full of bodies and bones

as I said, came by again yesterday
if a car could leer…
one of those foreign types

must have been yes checking us out

but we can put two and two together
so it was going to be us this time

lots of stuff missing
rakes and buckets, long handled brooms
all sorts of things we can’t find

thieving bastards!
the fifty bucks Liz lost
well now you know

shovels and ladders
(good for burying)

and I thought
next time next time
I’ll grab that bastard by the throat
then he’ll know what’s what

some have reported an evil laugh
foul exhaust
though that could be imagination

I am assuming it is a bloke
or more than one
probably a gang
I’m sure at the least there’d be an accomplice

it’s probably a terror plot
no bombs thrown yet
that’s to give a false sense…
they’ll give nothing away, of course
why would you give them the chance?

might have thought it would be a black van
you know like a black hat in a cowboy story
they’re cunning though
however they come it’s some kind of disguise
… just as long as you know

I don’t think it’s a country thing either
could happen anywhere

we just have to watch out
look out for our own
that’s all there is to it
be on your guard!
be aware!

I know these bastards
what they’re up to
think they can get away with
know the type
think they’re smart

that’s why this morning
when I saw the van coming again
I marched right up to the gate
to make a stand this time

yes they say ‘approach with caution’
and I had the mattock with me
casually slung of course
not to arouse…

he leant out of his window
smarmy, smug
crooked little leer he had
you wouldn’t know how to read it
you wouldn’t know what he was thinking
but
I’ll never forget that face

he held something flat
and oblong in his right mitt
kept the other paw on the wheel
for a quick getaway I bet

he held that thing out to me
as I came up
and then with a rapid hand movement
grabbed another something, thicker too

and then he just said
all innocent like butter wouldn’t melt
he said
‘mate, here’s your mail’

Thursday, August 29, 2019

Kerri Shying R #560 fruit felons

fruit felons

oranges   lose at hide and seek
thick skins my arse

sure they can stay put
behind the cabinet   silent

weeks on end  the mongrels
betray themselves   sneaks

of smell  citrus and mildew
roll out  like a tram line

no-one wants
unstoppable

you can't find 
who to blame   how

to make
it stop

Rob Schackne #991 - "I love the luminosity"


I love the luminosity
she wrote, geometry
the quality of rust in
alien photographs

I sit back, blow hard
stretching canvas
the crystal building
a thousand stories tall
inside the small room

writing up a storm
a million dark poems
listen to the rain

outside the window
what more is there
why wouldn't I pray
for understanding


Kit Kelen #1337 - an improvisation

1337
an improvisation

for ataraxia

rough thing my garden
approximate
much as my mother’s

has its own distances
keeps no account
time is nothing to it

rough and all guess
full of birds my garden is
music of just who’s about

all alive here
even the dead
how spirited they come

and not at all
why thank you

we build in it
to show straight lines

so many moods there are
you may ask what I am thinking

whirligig at times
here are the bees
the other little wings
undaunted

having turned a world to be here

sun new very day
has all the years tended me
coming to be

how sad to be among the books
shaped by accidents of fire, of sky

the garden requires me
outside certain hours
I always need its help

through it to yoga
and the sun comes too
hesitating till a poem
could lead to breakfast
that is there as well

prowl and growl
won’t I eat them all alive?

lovely to be run out of words
so struck with the weather, stars

I do a little dance
it always does for me

and find the head
whose god it is in
one gives a life for that

though it overgrows me
I keep the garden always in mind

and sometimes at a jog
might rush the blood around
impatient still and seasons come

I practise at a stillness there
always fail

listen for the echoes
where I am all but gone 

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Rob Schackne #990 - "Effortless chance"


Effortless chance
of rain is good
moving closer
getting windy
end of winter
on the back porch
I'm listening to
some J.J. Cale
the birds amped up
gathering supplies
thinking a poem
of natural blues
crazy mama
where ya been so long
it's almost spring
the dark clouds
this afternoon

Kerri Shying R #559 - Autonomic Neuropathy

Autonomic Neuropathy

I ate breakfast
I ate breakfast

I ate breakfast on the porch
action once akin to the inflation of a dirigible
before dawn      that

inclination   automation   habit   hunger
gone   I ate breakfast

wish you'd seen it
it was grand

Kit Kelen #1336 - when I was little


1336
when I was little

the house was big
the garden, the cubby

the universe was of unknown extent
didn’t have a name

time took forever in it
I’d come such a little way

light fed me
and first words – your face

yet to stretch
even the truth

was sunk in a softness
and had been cradled

I saw the sunbeam strewn with worlds
and came to a dizzy tune

heart beat home
everyone ached to be older then

and able to…
I had no fear words wouldn’t come

I know it is all around me
love and the world are one

roll off and ask
how was it for you?

then I was a teddy bear at the picnic
you still say I’ll do