KA Rees #15 - Headshell down

Headshell down

 

A record plays in the lounge room,

it skips and skips and skips the ten cents

has of fallen off or a flatmate grabbed it

on the way—they were ten cents short

pay day still two days away. Home brew

smells out the tub, paint peels from walls

guttered with grey blobs of tak. A shoe

hangs from the prayer tree, the grass

hasn’t been mowed in months. The shower

is in the kitchen; the hot water heater the

tub, you have to be careful not to get

third degree burns showering while drunk.

But the night sky still can be beautiful—

the house remains forever cold,

the warmest place to be is right next

to the stove, but if you’ve had four longies

of Coopers you can sleep out under stars

in dim evening light you see the sulphur,

and hear an ambulance pulse down city road.