Kit Kelen #1435 - a fatality of flaws

1435

a fatality of flaws

(reasons to resent myself)

here’s a failure to act

grown fat with

as if no tomorrow

will it have rained by then?

pretending again

lost to the image of

funds down

are we a bottomless pit?

smoke through the stillness

on and on

everything dead of a garden

and come again the rains too late

what to keep alive

not the bones creaking

not the old aches

here in the wish want

too much once more

been bad I’ve been

not listened, seen

can’t hear me, can you?

down and down

a why bother

flares up

when we disagree

it’s like this

doubt a self, doubt all

greedy so fallen

pride cometh here, there

catch us in a lie at home

smoke through all the doors

the windows

can see through it

new old denials

at a time like this

when we disagree, nod

you’re not listening

niggle a way through the dim

the dead and the half dead

the dying yet

who will we keep alive?

in a certain light

the reality is

won’t be the truth

to set you free

sun’s too red

and the moon is too  

like a lamp left on

shone glass through

here are the hours we have

last of all

go under in the thing

greed for the numbers themselves

fight, someone said

it’s a home for those creatures

in days of the catastrophe

that summer after the election

they’ll say there was five minutes

waking then back to it

swim in the mirror

who’s fairest?

and then I am worse for

I’m made mean   

can cultivate not mattering

yet it always does

the forest smokes indoors

in the car with the kids as well

must be the work of a government

minor parties can’t do this

I over we by all this time  

the noise, funds down, the fighting

how I distract myself – rub here

and polish then everything gone

breathless with the smoke

or is it argument?

exasperate

you are so far

close eyes, shrug, raise brows

it’s off a duck’s back, mock

give it an inch and we vanish

and if not perfect, when?

how hard is it?

admit, apologize, agree

let all souls be lit

and other nothings shine

then can we go on

go under in the thing

so, in the firstness, come to light

every bird will sing 

Kit Kelen #1434 - last of all

1434

last of all

go to the moment

words lost for

see through the smoke

I’m on fire

no ordering of interest

no argument for truth

not before

but behind

the life flash

and the measure had

no leaf will fall

no feathers to my wonder

go to the moment

we were before

beyond a thought to this

expansion empire inward

demons yes may well have tricked

I’ll bet the house there was a moment

knew my name

when I was well aware

muck of having been’s

as soul-less as the waking was

last of all

go to the moment

nobody says ‘time’s up’

but if with God then out of time

always the other way round

I was this world’s guest – lucky break

back to cosy prison void?

or as a snail – don’t think so

such striving to dodge juggernaut

equally to be wheel-free

when do you remember pain?

here is the nothing of death

you’re not there
a face – call it love

go there to the moment

I was, we were

when what I dreamt is gone 

Kerri Shying R # 599 - parental advice

parental advice

you can disguise the way
your past stinks
fake a shallow grave just
halve the normal depth   so your decoy
fuckwittery can be inserted
as a gravel bed   to divert a nose from
sin guilt   shame

your belief that
others ought not  look your
way
again  

you
take the corpse of something small a
crime of less significance     classic
is the body of a dog
to hide the remnants
of a man

let
the finding of the one   account for the stench
of that it pains you to explain   admit
account for nothing

who digs
deeper anyway

KA Rees #66 - Hairy Panic

Hairy Panic

Glandular like fervour, the rutting strut found

in abundance, given permission to flourish.

Seedhead blown

into gates and grounds of houses in Wangaratta mounds

of straw coloured grasses, dry moving, quick

like breath across glass stir into cracks and crevasses,

swallow up window space of the new development

in town.

Rob Schackne #1036 - RSVP

                      RSVP

          First responder network
          bring the love to bear

          all that life in trees
          where to go from there

          will you hear above the cracking
          will it be unspeakable

          beating up the wrong guy
          where’s that guitar

          check the microphone
          poetry’s the better fire

Kit Kelen #1433 - tending forest

1433

tending forest

first thing

where I am

arrested in light

I attend a forest

first thing

say moment

its own edge chords

melodic range

breezes have followed us in

who lets whom?

that’s for rhythm

(word to insist)

dust for the settling

wind!

watch out for the widow maker

branches of flame

and leaves to catch

someone is climbing yet

and cling

goanna flat

be bark

as stars are wordless large

I have my silences from this

the track is through it, turns

and there is the unseen

where are we

flesh and banquet?

I have my silences from this

on for young and old

then how a clock bears down

from inside

traps of

is it brave to be at all?

won’t have been these pawprints long

when time and times

even in ash

persisting ache

one day soon

leaf by leaf

it’ll be trying to

put together again

in tines of after rain

the fork stands till the garden

I am a thing endured

the forest is tending me

KA Rees #65 - Green grass of home

Green grass of home

Over grounds of variegated green

the sound of mowers

chomping limbs, fingers, toes, extremities

that fat shock, a petrol charged rev,

fumes spread in threads of morning

air. Pushing upward funnels of grass catch—

Spinifex, Pennstripe Pennisetum, feathery flower plume,

foxtails fantale in the shifting midday breeze

kangaroo grass, long stems riding Thelma & Louise, the late afternoon

air is throaty hot. White top, twister prance, Blown grass — knotty

dancer, Box grass, Bush wire, the tiny hairs on fitted leaves:

culmes, socket-like links in the chain. Common Wheat

grass. Auricles spear droplets of water, Cotton Panic

the ballroom overrun with umbrella grass, many type Mitchell

grasses glumes bulge around the spear, the tongue of seed.

Rob Schackne #1035 - Cartography (1)

   
   
       
        Cartography (1)

         
          Cartography: first map
          how we dried the winds

          cracked it all, salt came
          then a thirst came after

          on the outer rim of breath
          we burned with fires

          stopped breathing I think
          ok, will breathe now

(I owe this poem to Kate L. McNamara & Aletta Bezuidenhout)

Kit Kelen #1432 - at the beginning of time

1432

at the beginning of time

deeper and steeper

first dollar, imagine

no, before that

the apple drops

a legend corner

till the map obeys

blacker than night, this prospect

stone to roll

and fire before

the burning bush

we are still recovering bones from that time

in the beginning

was, was it?

yet to kick off

first notes then the lyrics came

as if we’d all been blinded

when there was no seeing then

nothing ached at all

but to be

then travel outwards

expanding

from dot

forever in the day

everyone trying to think of

title, genre, epigraph

it must have been a morning in spring

at the beginning

or in

ants tell the lost truth

none dare speak

hope, prayers with them

a flower everything

an eye will see

the all exploding

and as if forever

a refuge in all that

Invitation to the 2019 Flying Islands’ Poets’ Picnic

Invitation to the 2019 Flying Islands’ Poets’ Picnic

on Sunday 22^nd December

At ARBARO

(Kit & Carol’s place)

878 Markwell Rd,

MARKWELL via BULAHDELAH NSW, 2423

The Picnick-ing of the Picnic begins at midday

Launches and Readings begin promptly at 1.30pm

GETTING HERE

once at Bulahdelah (you can find it!)

drive down the main street (Stroud St)

keep going as Stroud St becomes Markwell Rd (though there isn’t a sign) which is the road you want …

drive OVER the roundabout at Lee St, to show your justified contempt for it, and keep going

… over the Fry’s Creek Bridge and the ford (considering nostalgically how from time to time you’d be washed away right here)

pass the country’s first fully solar powered robotic dairy (sneer anyway if yr vegan)

pass sheds of chook shame (sneer if yr human)

dodge wallabies

pass the Cabbage Tree off (pass it! Horseman, cast a cold eye no matter what the GPS says)

acknowledge the Worimi people

pass Old Inn Road on your left (no need to seek the old inn though)

do you recognize the old church at Rosenthal? (well disguised)

and in moments (as a real estate agent would say) yll simply find yrself there

– our place is number 878 because it's 8.78 kms from the PO at Bulahdelah

(so you could set yr tripmeter and rely on that)

our place is the first driveway on the right, right after the Markwell sign

please park up the top of the place (plenty of parking on the side of the road) unless yr camping the night (and know where you’re going) or have special needs (and know where you’re going)

Hint – remember to stay on the tar and don’t be seduced by Markwell Back Road

(a dusty and dangerous place on the wrong side of the river [note fierce rivalry and ghost stories with spooked horses])

THE RUNDOWN

Midday - the Picnick-ing of the Picnic begins

1.30 - Launches and Readings begin

There are eight new books coming out this year in the Flying Islands’ Pocket Poets’ Series and five of them will be launched at the picnic, as per the rundown below.

1.30 – 2.30

M/C – Sarah St Vincent Welch

Kerri Shying’s Knitting Mangrove Roots to be launched by Gail Hennessy

2.30 – 3.30

M/C – Anna Couani

George Watt’s Sandpaper Swimming – Going After Burke & Wills  

to be launched by Richard Allen

3.30 – 4.30

M/C – Dael Allison

Geoff Page’s Codicil to be launched by Judy Johnson

4.30 – 5.30

M/C – Brian Purcell

Clark Gormley’s Not What You Think   to be launched by Ed Wright

5.30 – 6.30

M/C –

Gillian Swain’s My skin its own sky to be launched by Magdelana Ball

If you want to read and/or play (and we want you to read and/or play!), please let me know and you shall be slotted somewhere into this sched-yule. Note – it must be your own stuff. No favourite poems by Blake or Dickinson. Reversionings (of all stripe) always welcome of course.

We anticipate decent gaps between the sessions and although there are no ‘parallel sessions’, we don’t expect everybody will see and listen to everyone… it might just be too much… and there are spots to quietly wander off for a sotto voce chinwag or kip or what-you-will devil may care so on…

Depending on the weather and so on, we may move the event around a bit in order to encourage the circulation of vital fluids. Note that water (& other liquid refreshment) in all forms is welcome!

7pm - we evacuate the picnic to …

DINNER AT THE PUB

Please let us know numbers by December 13th as the pub needs to plan!

When we have the list of all who wish to perform we’ll update the rundown

meanwhile

DON’T FORGET

togs and towel and hat for a swim

your stuff to read and instruments of torture

It's a BYO picnic. So please bring things like –

picnic blanket

chairs (if you like sitting. We'll have some but not enough)

picnic tucker in picnic basket (water cress sandwiches?)

drinks of choice (ginger pop?)

A NOTE ON ACCOMMODATION

The on-site accommodation is reserved for launchers and launchees (and they know who they are). Apart from that, there is plenty of space to camp and there is a kitchen and bathroom and dunny belonging to our camping  ZONE (also known as ‘the other side of the creek’ [were the creek to flow there would be a general hooting and a hollerin’ in celebration … and though there was a recent raindance on the driveway with colourful feathers, this nevertheless remains unlikely]).

Beyond our borders, in the vassal town of Bulahdelah, are many accommodation options.  There are four motels (one already booked out), there is the pub, there are two camping/cabin places and there are other van camping spots as well. There are some airbnbs dotted about here and there. Please write if you want more details of the options.

There are plenty of reasons to hang around the district, if you want to make a weekend of it; to whit Myall Lakes National Park, beaches like Hawks Nest and Seals Rocks, Pacific Palms, etc; Cabbage Tree Mountain behind us. If you want to make your tour more of a poetry event, you can always travel the whole of the Bulahdelah-Taree Holiday Song Cycle (in which Markwell does receive an honourable mention). Keep driving along our lovely road and you'll get to Gloucester the nicest way, then that track turns into Thunderbolt's Way (now fully sealed) and you're on the way to Armidale. Highly recommended.

A NOTE ON WATER AND TOILETS AND SO ON

The main thing to note about water is how little of it there is… then again, each of us is comprised 70% of the stuff, so we must be able to make use of this somehow. For instance, within the bounds of decency, urination on trees is particularly encouraged. (This may be more of a boy thing, but we’re just sayin’.) The main toilets to use are at the top and the bottom of our house. The dunny in the Zone is only meant for overnight use and only for solid waste (and you would not wish to set off the urination detection alarm, not for quids). Likewise, the flushing of the house loos will be reserved for number twos – along the lines of the time honoured dictum: ‘if it’s yellow let it mellow’. This may have already been too much information.

A NOTE ON CREATURES AND CLOSING OF DOORS

There are a few snakes and spiders about,  so look where you are walking, and use a torch if you’re here after dark. As well as insect life, there are plenty of microbats as well as marsupial rats in the vicinity, and we prefer not to share territory with these. (The microbats have amazing navigational abilities and won’t fly into you but never pick one up because, if bitten, you’ll end up on a course of painful rabies injections.) So please be vigilant about closing doors after yourself. So much easier than evicting our animal and insect friends before bed.

So before Dec 13^th please RSVP to kitkelen@emeritus.um.edu.mo

to tell us

if you’re coming

if you want to read/sing/play us a song (note: all contributions MUST be original…  no covers!)

if you’re coming to the pub for dinner

if you want to camp (the night before or the night after)

HELPING

We do need help with setting up and so on, so please do let us know if you have a spare shoulder to put to the wheel prior to the commencement of festivities. You’re welcome to stay the night before.

Rob Schackne #1034 - A Wake

A Wake

Dress in black
drink a lot   laugh
have a good time
no outsider
remember a life
why they loved you
wake in happiness
(with a slight hangover)
light through the curtains
just lie there   where
do you get coffee

Jeffree Skewes # 142 Acted

Say we have empathy
to an idea this life's a journey
lived as if we know it's worth

say if empathy was a thing
grown and nurtured by intention alone
then so the journey begins

say we didn't need to slave
other than to craft the walking
or landing when sometimes we fall

say only sunshine and dreams
mattered most even though you say
someone has to pay to play

say the stock market
was no longer the measure
but happiness at all costs our true ambition

say the world was nothing but a stage
we acted and directed and learned our lines
say this work was theatre make-believe

say everyone understood it was our purpose
to show-off and practice what we really love
we'd all be actors and those who watched acted too

say numbers flocked to stages and not to work
would there be a need for generals thieves or slaves
even if not

we acted it was true

image: Water Dragon - detail / synthetic polymer paint & ink on recycled rice paper JMS 2018

Kit Kelen #1431 - made up of moods

1431

made up of moods

(singular event)

touched till

once when then nostalgia

riff

leaf lit

up she rises

and hooray

of moment

the pleasing

and the after, sad

all wordlessly

can’t help but

be blessed

and damn your eyes

come crashing from

the pills

mostly spells

off kilter on again

a run, a variation

all cast about sugar hit

see the circle into, on

discovery of you-tell-me

arrow points up

to follow a curve

there is a breeze

in my branches

key change

inebriants

come gather you

scrum

so pitter patter

all meaning

here’s for horizon

altogether now

three cheers

Rob Schackne #1033 - "Famous for a poem" (redux)

Famous for a poem
written when he was drunk
he doesn’t like it now
its edges curled
trodden wet leaves
he takes a walk with umbrella
in ten minutes sees the marvelous
it reminds him of prayer
a great love, a missed flight
an arrow, a bed, a blister
his film is screened
once, twice, three times a week
he wishes he wasn't famous
several people watching
one gentle soul claps

one gets up and leaves
there's a kind of organ music

KA Rees #64 - Charnel Ground

Charnel Ground

The politician sings and stomps his feet, waves a fist

of stolen emu feathers in an approximation to what he’s seen

on film, doesn’t understand this dance — any open handed

gesture (of his ringed fingers) will do. These grounds once

curated, kept knowingly, now thousands of kilometres of ashen trees, bodies

of koalas wrapped blackly around trunks spearing sky with their leafless silhouettes.

The politician practices his coal dance turning the granulated chunk,

catching his smirk across its inked surface, watches as bodies

and entire towns are brought to the charnel ground.

Kit Kelen #1430 - animals in my life

1430

animals in my life

bounce by

they light and lift

bank swoop

some surefoot

thoughtless

light of heart

so seeming wise

in what to do

indoors in walls

in thoughts and prayers

the you for instance

others all

and in the end

far seen hunting

come grisly sudden

a skitter and a slink

they lack the winking lid

hide in a cloud, squeeze

hope against

how is their sleep consisting?

cultivate cute

see sneeze

all paws

run the rug

make a dash and sweat for it

never out of ink, ideas

how often they seem to miss the point

wild, and they’re vanished

to camouflage, to ground

tangle of grammar have at

they creep

lovely in their lies

accused of prayer

populate a documentary

rhymed with gone

and smelt them then

day is their having risen

as when I creature it for comfort

and animal myself

in blazing catch

eyes for a dark

to throw paths

die of an honest thirst

they themselves bitten

still linger

come what may

death the unknown

an instant away

and full of tricks as all are

coming through the webs

as if you’d won the race

you’d never known about

these animals, my intimates

as nameless to me

as I to them

we none of us are tame

but

slip through a crack in the dream

just as far as it takes to be

Kerri Shying R #598 - in zombieland

in zombieland

6am I forgot to see
the sky
starred cream flowers
open

yesterday the country danced
felt feet stamp  the
sorrow ground

to bees who beat veined
invisible
mile high wings the wind
a thousand mile
an hour when you weigh
a gram

a sunbeam
at the cusp
of all this DNA
you fly

KA Rees #63 - Tufts

Tufts

Tip of a feather, a rust coloured eye spying

down from the sky. In the under, scurrying,

a brief feint and a mass of swirling struggle

sharp points serrate lacerate eviscerate

the leavings are all that is left, scattered tufts

the fawn coloured pelt all over the lawn.

Coalescence Part 5 # Claine Keily 143

I awake to the sound of motors, pumped up, showcase style. Sleepless now, I water the burnt leaves in my garden, sip coffee, then throw down birdseed for the crows. I put out water for the abandoned cat who is lumbered with new kittens.


The machines shine in the yard of the house beside me. They are new toys. My neighbours- only employed for a month now- have bought them. These objects are a reward for their monosyllabic understanding of the world.


Soon it will all collapse. The trucks they drive for work will soon be self driven, and the owners will take everything. The houses they live in now will wear shredded curtains. Once more the brothers will be forced to live with their sisters, who, pumped full of child work at the local supermarket until the welfare payments arrive.

Kerri Shying #597 - under the swivel eye so long

under the swivel eye so long

everyone's in bed all animals I'm regressed
beyond the membranes of the social
into fur a christmas beetle
burrs in to land on my pillow I've become the pond
the tree the paddock in the land

struck dumb watching discs
on my dullard old tv private alone I
am the new porn no-one tracks my
eyeline clicks each time    I slip off to take
a wee I'm fragile

in the air
a pool of neighbour noise gamers' bass
the throats of frogs
                        blissing in the owl-free yard I know
I am the frog I feel
the temperature of water in this
vessel as it cools

Kit Kelen #1429 - tick tock

1429

tick tock

there’s some part of the clock we inhabit

tell the tune far far green

somewhere we certain anxious rush

or signature of time

trails off

you couldn’t dream the numbers

they get you off

metabolism a Christmas come

and Easter in

hair trigger

further in a season fold

under hat

with tip tap rain

and here for ease

a grace note rest

we’ll come to the top by’n’by

it’s next year in Jerusalem

here is my rewards card

tricks first of fire

when time burnt a hole

in all pockets

when we were young, beautiful

never knew

and now is it a battery runs down?

who can tell mechanism?

wind-up tribes of a crime have flocked

surveillance!  all under eternity’s eye

luck pours through and out

the others side

tap dripping still

only the night of hours between

fell into the mirror once

came up with this form of words

and it’s here the condemned

welcome dawn again

into the lonely cell

association’s progress scars

I was that rabbit

fob watch in my face

and mustn’t mustn’t be late 

Rob Schackne #1032 - A Track

A  Track

She grew up on a station off the Birdsville Track. 

She lived there for twenty years. 
It never rained. 
A new stockman was put on. 
A week after the stranger came it rained for a week. 
She remembered how noisy it was. 
She left for Uni and lasted a year. 
After that there were thousands of miles. 
Years passed in the eight directions. 
They talked about animals and the weather forecast. 
There was fire on the mountain. 
It was far away. 
It was local.
Everything was so quiet. 
They barely recognised each other.