Béatrice Machet # 353 QUICKENING PACE (as a linear function)

 # 353 

QUICKENING PACE

It was towards evening. She walked until the light was dim.

And she pursued transparence within a dark confusion.

Only the wind was favored to win. It wouldn’t harm a flea.

Only numbers in her counting head to give some kind of coherency.

And her singing that went like this:

the S warm of the bee function

& the sum of hives

& the quantity of insecticide

& the different yellows of pollens ….

Towards evening.

Extinction.

ACCELERATION DU RYTHME (en tant que fonction linéaire)

On s’en allait vers le soir. Elle marcha jusqu’à ce que la lumière fût mince.

Elle poursuivit la transparence dans une sombre confusion.

Seul le vent pour être donné gagnant. Cela ne ferait pas de mal à une mouche.

Seuls les nombres dans sa tête compteuse pour assurer une certaine cohérence.

Et son chant qui disait ceci :

Le S1 de la fonction abeille

& la somme des ruches

& la quantité d’insecticides

& les différents jaunes des pollens

Vers le soir.

L’extinction.

Rob Schackne #246 - "On a wave of art history"

On a wave of art history
I'm giving a little lecture
today on abstract expressionism
to my seven students
and on master Mark Rothko

(I know almost nothing about it but
when has that ever stopped a teacher)
who once said that great art
along with conflict & death
has to have 10% of hope
I say this is both a wildly optimistic view
and a wildly pessimistic one
now pause for a moment
looking beyond yourself
at the world and the etceteras
(on a reef of bad management)
what do you reckon
the fellow up the front
misunderstands the question

in record time
everyone should have 100%
I make with a baleful look
cut it out I say
it’s just homemade blood
(now they're checking their messages)
the class ends as if nothing were a painting
it ends as if it were all a painting
I switch off the projector

Introduction # 72 Claine Keily

She crossed her legs
tried to make it seem
effortless
for she had disliked
the way he held
his cup so close
to his mouth
when he spoke to her
even though he had finished drinking

By way of introduction
he had commented
on the pockmarks
now almost completely faded
on her chin

That was the first time
she turned from him
towards the bookshelves
beside her front door
and decided
the money she had spent
on the dress patterned
with orange flowers
would have been better spent
on further volumes
by Dickinson and the Brontes

Kristen de Kline #61 - while you were away

while you were away they hitched out of of Roadkill took down the fencing traversed forests of fur melting stickiness bodies things going nowhere people arguing over how to define fungus and dirt muttering something about not coming back while you were away they scribbled lines about the possibility of falling into a shed trees birds writing our poems tripping around wet houses with dreams flying out bombmakers white walls fingers touching it's all been happening while you were away ripped wire damaged love scars you melted fell tripped trapped in a town called Roadkill you were going nowhere

Kit Kelen - #408 - the invention of sex

408

the invention of sex

nothing described makes any sense

forests of fur, expanses of flesh

backhoe and dozer

this humility we sweat for

wasn't the first house

umbrella of breezes?

weren't first songs sung here?

eukaryotes

hail!

single cell god

half a billion years of

stone come to leaf

just the last hour and a half of Earth's long day

when we measured by this still breathing

stamen and pistil

flirt

then

everything made melts

a dizzy stillness in the branches

are wings

and beak

and wet with want

sticky out

and sticky in

here's forever and a day

why finite hearts come yearning

call names and you come to them

a tentative violence alive with love

but will it last till lights are out?

It's as if slept in your long dark

the every tended dreaming track

the forest brings its way to light

you'll never rationalise the body

every sweet nothing

to lodge in a dream

in your head

pyjamas of the naked mind

show just the barest outline

touch

all in the tree's green life

not a moment missing

and that's why

not just why we're here

but why we yearn for more

James Walton #36 The Fencer and the Sunset: Eight Bars for Broken Strings

The ripped wire is back up uncurled recycled

 twice the effort for half the result

(I hear the scent of you smiling in the fragrant drapery of the orange tree),

but happy doing the right thing

witnessed by how much the disinfectant stings my hands

All those cuts for a little comfort and of course pleasure

in some resurrection of boundary and grass and greedy eating to come

and my own thoughts meandering pulling wire,

moments elliptic in steps and crouching straining to get the line

where diluted end of Autumn sun naps in the company of old dancers

There’s no desecration Sandi your ashes are still here

spread smudged and taken up by so much other life

a blue tongue’s watching almost heedless but still wary,

in its somnolent crocodile wobble of possession to let me know

where the return will be

Out over the decline to a different eco system

in front of what’s left of the hay shed

splattered hills are garnished like a blanket thrown over something,

that should have been picked up first

by an impressionist God impatient in passing

Flung sheets of tin once wall hedge up against the slope

I come on with too much purpose to see

the eagle shakes loose first like a patient escaping a straightjacket,

then wings stretch awkwardly as air unhelpfully holds out the coat

dressed now time bends in clumsy first strokes to lift off

In a Chinese master’s moves of an order too ancient to be named

saplings become bamboo walking steps to the air as one to another

private whispers invoke the parting envelop of change,

sudden majesty takes over and the sky is slipping through gears

without the hesitation of physics

Predicted afternoon showers dawdle

eyelash rains drizzle failure river crays go salty waiting

last rites sing to bend rye,

in the ceaseless head space of dung beetles

going over all that was to be again

Laying down in the soft cashmere pullover of clover

drowsy between the shoulder and breast

of all the day’s murmuring staccato,

remembering how you flew in laughter diving ahead to pick me up in the turn

of a spinning durst of vermillion flamenco

Rob Schackne #245 - "After it all"

After it all
I shall probably
fall into a shed
surrounded by trees
and listen to birds
write my poems

Refusal # 71 Claine Keily

He said
"Don't do that here
the neighbours will see"
as he wiped away the dirt
from his brow. "There should be
a lawn here, and if not
all around us
will know that you are mad."

Things were going nowhere
she argued with him
about definitions
of dirt and fungus
and at night
refused to season lentils
at short notice

Kit Kelen #407 - how did words become a prayer

407

how did words become a prayer?

no, that's the wrong question

the prayer was there before words came

we lived in hope

no, expectation

all night wishing

so saw dawn spoken

any light is revelation

when your fire's gone out

moment to moment – there's your answer

first light was because the hands together held

this half shut flower

a foolish heart would make-believe

heavens heard the muttering

and took us for dumb beasts

Merchandise # 70 Claine Keily

Like some piece
of damaged merchandise
she polished herself
for conjugal life
plucked her eyebrows
learnt to cook puddings
and make stews
then in her dreams
she began to list
the lands she wanted
to visit
and wagered these
against the cost of
the honeymoon
then threw away
all plans
to dress in white
to work hard to reduce
her measurements
and cast out the scented balms
she had bought
to smooth her lips

James Walton #35 On the Dial

A February day

cracked by constant drizzle

like a thin glass in hot water

penguin piss that finally came

with the so often delayed Antarctic front

I’m making dhal

Jackson Browne is on loud

songs about the minimum wage

and small town shows running late

crowds with thinned liquor and smokes

You’re in the city

trammed back from Bennett’s Lane

and espresso chocolate martini gigs

I’ve lost the sheets to the sudden gales

caught and dyed blackberry in the fifteen acre gully

Walking the horses

laughing at the sling gate

how they stared trying to tell me

that a bark is different to a squawk

as the eagle’s droopy nonchalance casts away

They swoon new grass

pass me in Miles Davis jamming

spurt their tails in plumes from paddocks

my jumper is sodden with details of Munich

your bed was next to the shower and how the door opened

Humming To Love Somebody

the moss on the roof is years away

leaning on the Norfolk Pine watching snotty clouds

curdling native blueberry along the crusty valley road

trying to avoid something country and western escaping

Mr Tambourine Man creeps in

and I can’t help it but my feet are moving

the fields are pages of ink dirt and parched white feed

tractors score lines dragging thistles out of a misty fleet

in a swarm of noise shallaying the truncated new horizon

I read it somewhere

the previous generation’s music

imprints in hidden vacuity occupies secret places

washing through ethereal surrounds exposing intimacies

leaving you hanging like a paper lantern at the end of a stick

Nina arrives suddenly

hitting a flat discord that doesn’t matter

and I’ve caught on to a Maria Callas fly by

of such ascendant laddering through the maze of days

that I can remember all the things I forgot to be who I am

Back in the kitchen

the only reception is Triple J or Classic FM

sometimes there’s a crackle that hints another state

unearthed doing dishes whistling Beethoven’s seventh

kilometres away the neighbour’s kelpie stretches pawing at the stations

Kit Kelen #406 - beyond good and evil

406

beyond good and evil

we're all getting ready to bury God

this is where praying will get you

we're lifting the frail bones down

did anyone ever live this long before?

we're bearing the pall

we're standing taut for the sermon

Jesus, it just goes on

and the singing is worse

it's the same handful of earth

we're dropping on that lid

this whole Earth was ash to begin

now here we go again

God's dead

but won't be buried, not quite

it's past sadness this thing

goes on and on

and wait, is that rigor mortis

or sit-ups after a nap?

thought we had Him done and dusted

then he does a Beetlejuice

stagey, but there seems to be a puff of breath

then no, a doubt creeps in

does it seem like eternity to you?

Rob Schackne #244 - "I stole a book that told me"

   


        I stole a book that told me
        about the other stolen books
        but they had lost their way...
        I know a few still hang in trees
        some even wait by the seaside

        for clouds to bring a rain of words
        & the wind to caress the last leaves
        they were tired of holding on to
        & perhaps the morning says
        I am tired of this life of crime
        the birds were hard awake
        where I lost my youth.

Kerri Shying R # 193 _ Towelling Hoods # 1

Towelling Hoods # 1

in the wet house  where all the dreams

came flying out   in the wet house

her other spaces fell about   in laughing at

the hope of ever   keeping sane   or getting

far away   in the wet house   drenched by sweat

of horror   drips that fall in pins of accuracy wished up

by a bombmaker    she rides on nightmares   just to make

the coffee  in the wet house   all the walls are white

in the wet house  only she can see  where fingers touched

the walls the floors the small folds of the human brain

meninges   metatarsals singing out    the shrill whistle of the

boiling kettle   tells her    his tea is ready

in the wet house

Rob Schackne #243 - "You got to be true to your code"

You got to be true to your code
or else see big walls tumble down
after the big storm to end all storms
loves dies a thousand times a second
see the end of trees and glorious oceans
make us out worse than the animals
who think they’re better victims than us
turn us into the killers we thought to be
the whales will never be refloated out to sea
and the rescuers shall wade past their depth
like nothing is ever coming back

Education # 69 Claine Keily

When she was awarded
her master's degree
she was offered
no more love

The love she had
been given before
by men
was shabby
and as defiled
as a flasher's favourite outfit
but now she found
even women were confused
by her
saw her
as a someone, no doubt
not a woman, like them
but a being
sure only to leave
filthy wet footprints
in their house

Kit Kelen #405 - the future is after us

405

the future is after us

it's not letting up

nor does it lag

it has the scent

of our trail

or you could say

there's a family resemblance

there isn't a turn

on which you can shake it

there's no little lane

to slip down

remorseless bastard

faster and faster

duck under a fence

dodge through the crowd

you pop up your head

look around and you'll see

and the future's still on its way

try to turn tail

it's still coming after

it's always had an eye on you

no one wants to be fatalistic

still, wasn't this always

where you'd end up

perhaps a few regrets?

it's not just the past

but the present is done with

the future is catching up

and not just that

try to turn things around

you'll find that it's getting away from you

so much for strategy

you've thought in terms of

some mountain retreat

some hideaway fastness

redoubt

but the future won't ever

leave you behind

it's like a church

you keep trying to leave

a habit you'll never kick

it doesn't matter you have no children

you're the one who can't keep up

ambition didn't do the trick

and now

you think if I'm no one

the future won't notice

fat chance!

you feel the hot breath

on your neck

you're being dragged along

you're the one kicking and screaming

you're desperate

you'll do anything now

you launch yourself

on a rocket into space

but after your orbit's decayed

and you're fallen to dust

you can bet the future

will still be around

your opinion will not be sought

the future's not going to care how you feel

the strangest thing is

we've been here before

I'm not sure how you feel

but I don't see the point of waiting around

when the future has never come yet

Transactions #68 Claine Keily

They live in different countries
and dress in white
thin mothers
and cider on
a hot afternoon

She is here
other
completing transactions
without comment
she has grown used to
bandages
that hide her wounds

Rob Schackne #242 - "Beside my side"

“Beside my side”


Beside my side 
is the other side
of all that I might see
a little out of mind
somewhat out of reach
and some call it depth
and some call it death
amid the laughter & the sun
and they carve messages
of intricate beauty
that are left behind
so others will remember
they must follow too
crossing the river down
where the imagination
(since all is heart & wisdom)
lies forgotten on the other side
one mirror backed against the night.