Rob Schackne #530 - "Wishing not"

Wishing not
though seems I am
my hurried plans
idling at the border
looks like a head start
courtesy of dreams
listening to birds
the penny pitched
faraway long ago
landing at my feet
neither worm nor egg
it's exile again
but will this be my bed
let me care a little

Kit Kelen #694 - more and more of us are struck by lightning

694

more and more of us are struck by lightning

betrayed!

the effort to make random marks

some have had heads read

all for a tumble from one month to next

webs gathering on a whim

stands your hair on end

God made instruments of some

which is to say the other way

but never simply so

it's like the rainbow

stands in your shoes

(you know the one I mean)

I'm not even touching the sides

stain on my fingers

is all I can find

day has us smeared on the slide

less and less of us

look up to see

what giant's eye peers in

Rob Schackne #529 - Empty The Times Today

Empty The Times Today

Mladic Conviction Closes Dark Chapter in Europe, 
but New Era of Uncertainty Looms

one of the worst atrocities in 20th-century Europe

Trump, in Twitter Rant, 

Revisits Grievances Against Sports Figures

After So Much Sadness,
What Is There to Be Thankful For?

since life was ripped apart

It's Thanksgiving. 
Come On Home.

Ratko Mladic Shouts at Judges at The Hague

Kit Kelen #693 - the echoes long after

693

the echoes long after

imagine a morning

you forget the poem

it goes on

all that's lit is lighter

you're in the music now

come tiptoe hungry

till breakfast begins

and gauge a slight vibration

that's when the story starts

could have been a book

but it turns out you're a scroll

and tumble open to the day

wide spread

the broadsheet world

of was still with

you think you can dance a way

out of this prison?

it's all in paint I sail

forget myself

imagine an ocean

others for the rigging and wheel

lengthways looking up

I see the mast is leafless

bells rung are any old

one is so eyes up for a sign

we could be somewhere else

there's smoke from

can't even see a stack

where a bird comes in

a window will open

just as suddenly I'm home

there isn't a word

will bend to my will

none of this would have happened

if you hadn't forgotten the poem

imagined a morning like this

Rob Schackne #528 - "The semifactual experiment" (3)

The semifactual experiment
setting the cart before the horse

e.g. would the same have happened
if the Euclidean had not held sway
and gone that way instead of this
(which is monstrous and silly)
but remiss not to mention those
who after all and before it ended
kept me for years in stitches.

Kit Kelen #692 - comes back to me

692

comes back to me

I'm where the trees grew

where the view was once

I'm where the leaf fell

see it twirling!

where the breeze was

here it comes again!

where the rain fell

now it's falling

I'm where the mouse went

rafter run

where wagtail skipped across the deck

I have a few feathers myself

the socks went in the wash

so I

I'm where the sun shone

and I reflect

I'm where the mountain, the ocean was

a moment ago --

black space

can you see how I work

the void to whim?

nobody knocks on the door

and most welcome

where the moon went down

I'm going

where the star fell

so I wish

I'm where the trees grew

here they are now

and the day's away with me

here like this

I'm much in the midst of time

Rob Schackne #527 - "The semifactual experiment" (2)

The semifactual experiment
(how the poem doesn't spare you)
e.g. if he'd fallen to the right
instead of the left and hit his head
would he still have scored an own-goal
or woken up one morning from the coma
is critical in criminal sportswriting.
In the hospital. Always nasty.
People dying. Don't try it.

Kit Kelen #691 - my bolts my blue

691
my bolts my blue

(hubris study)

today I am reinventing the wheel
mine's so much rounder than the one before

anyway as you can imagine
I'm on a roll
and so far today
I have come up with breakfast
more roof overhead

elevenses suggests a clock
take it for a spin

I'm thinking of covering myself
to stay warm
or keep off the sun

top of the head
could be something round too!

how about a pill?

I'm coming to first principles
and I'll get there in the end

this world I'm working on's all oyster

I'm squaring the circle
I've go the peg to fit
I believe I have found the north west passage
(you can see it clearly on the map)

I'm an untying the trickiest knot
I've made up some riddles for a sphinx

unstoppable!

I just had a thought - the flower!
don't know how I do it
but I keep all of this stuff in my head

and you can see them sprayed up on a wall

take this thing I've made called music
it fills out the empty air

tonight I will invent the bed
then consider dream

and love - let's make that
and next - picture

you might think the words are spoken for us
but every day it's a new language I make

imagine the screen where just everything is

thought is the best thing I've come up with so far

but then there's the pension and Christmas

of course I am always inventing myself
I pick all the gods on my team

you, of course, are my favourite fiction

you know that I am inventing the world
you realize it could be rounder

yes there's a risk of going under
but it hasn't stopped me so far

I'll be putting the trees on the leaf tomorrow

and I will come to fire
and I will come to rain

Kristen de Kline #173 God, the fifth day (after R.S)

God, the fifth day
passed

and I didn't

think of you

in another poem
about nothing

there's a memory of standing
on a Honolulu hotel balcony

your arm   around me
screen shots of blurred highways

and palms, bent double
around me   still   your arm

the airport shuttle takes
another wrong turn

Victor, the driver, says:
I've got no idea where you're leading me
what the fuck you're talking about

God, the fifth day
passed

I almost missed the flight

recovering bodies

hold me tighter

storm is coming

dig faster

Rob Schackne #526 - "We've generally hated"

We've generally hated
pop music forever
but would you
as soon recoil
from a hit poem
even as you wrote it

The ends are mawkish
the middle's a bit soft
but gloriously loved
like a national anthem
how long did I avoid it
and how does the song go

God, the eighth day
we never went to sleep
the bird attacks the window
a little something you won't forget
something something sexy flower
it'll come to me in a minute

Kit Kelen #690 - another note on the method

690

another note on the method

live off

first anxiety

where will I find a shape

my line?

it's black

the night

we dream

and day is

too much lit

so bright

too much to see

must squint

if to see stars in the day

and join the dots

for constellation

where will I find my line

how follow?

no one tells me

I'm all ears

and then I see

the mark that's there already

must have been me made that

I'm away

lie with the lines first thing

and curl, uncoil

all fall in

queue

all raggedly

I'm well fed with

now I'm not saying inspiration

yet as I live and breathe

something will suggest itself

there's nextness in among it all

perhaps because I've been before

no time to wait

for praise

I scratch a way

and so

call a poem

in the end

that's how a draft's

let in

Kerri Shying R # 360 Light Rail, baby

Light Rail, baby

at Star City the gamblers got off   all sour-faced    expressions stolen

we eased into their spaces    exhaling our unshackled air    where there

just now     the gambler stood   pretending we had known

all along    that this was what they were    shifting in the temperate zone

morals    up the sides follicles burst spontaneously from the ovaries

of the barren  allelujah    cells of gratitude knowing    that their bread was going to  one day need some butter    and it is better    to go to the fridge than smear packet after packet of 7g devondales saved up in a suit pocket from a complimentary breakfast at a casino    these were the embryos preparing to be born     some few stops away   beyond the markets and the centre      out where the Glebe Estates began

Kit Kelen #689 - bower bird attacks my window

689

bower bird attacks my window

does that make me blue?

I'm something spirited

off for a charm

someone shakes my bed in the night

(so real, as if a proof)

that was a tour of haunted Iceland

where trolls have the roads away

lost in the moss

the rodents quiet

I hope python has them

what's got the frogs so loud?

or is it just the one

under verandah

that was night

and now the bower bird

attacks its archetype

mon semblable, mon frère

self-efficacy issue here

myself must face

the day has come at last

Rob Schackne #525 - "The semifactual experiment" (1)

The semifactual experiment
e.g. if he’d tripped left instead
of right with the ball dribbling
at that speed would he still have
scored an own-goal, is essential
in clinical sportswriting. Now
of course this can be extended
to ponder other types of situations.
Tonight the writer spares you that.

Kerri Shying R - # 359 - Mrs Agapanthus

Mrs Agapanthus

A week you labour

 out the front    alone

in the bed of succulents

 pod split

purple multigravida

 my fingers   itch

to peel you back

 take your silver

hymen   bring you

 here   to born

Kit Kelen #688 - the clocks are singing again

688

the clocks are singing again

sun blinds through

all sleep past

it's only truth they tell

it strikes in my head

this tick

and this tock

I must not

must not

listen

the clocks are singing again

when they stop

all sigh for time lost

to forever

Rob Schackne #524 - "By the 5th day" (after KdK)

By the 5th day
from a distance

recovering bodies

what we failed
to recognize

run out of words

storm is coming
digging faster

Kristen de Kline #172 Recovering bodies

listening to songs of love
don't hold back the tears

his mother throws
herself into the river

the artist sleeps
with one eye open

two weeks later
they recover her body

she burns a double page
newspaper, mops the floor

fills up a chrome bowl
with an aluminum kettle

he lights a candle, carries
the wick into another room

wavers it over a pair of shoes
neatly lined up on the floor

the artist poses in a bowler hat
smokes an old fashioned pipe

an Unidentified Man
looks you in the eye

the ghosts are dead or
dying     that's about all

I've   got to say   I've
run out of words

don't hold back
those tears
 
switch the station
find another poem

to tune into, throw
a blanket over the body

shut both eyes

don't look back

Kristen de Kline #171 Distance

I

a whole country
between
us

is not
enough


II

I soaked up old Sydney town
that whore, she gobbled me

whole
 
a solar panel glitters in the sky
Redfern Chippendale Newtown

down at Circular Quay, sea spray 
flirts with the side of my face

a man painted in silver, corpse-like
collects coins in a fisherman's hat

again   I can    breathe 

again


III

in roof-top bars and lane ways
prawn laksa, cold pints of Stella on tap

hit and run kisses
fleeing in the night air

lip-stick prints
on a Jeststar boarding pass

can I miss my plane

do I have to come
down


IV

an entire country

is not far enough

away

Kit Kelen #687 - so the rain's created

687

so the rain's created

and a roof's to hear it fall

it's out of nothing cloud

well within this

thought extols

and memory

as of a cloudless blue

then come horizon

herring knit

or just a little anvil floats

till archipelago

see out a window fogged

each third leaf atwitch with it

then every one

and all

how the aching joints foretold!

the rain arrives

sometimes from a season's want

and feels a way at first

as if below there must be Earth

the planet of sweet rain!

you could rot from it

or rise up singing

the rain calls

just for a minute

you might have missed

there isn't a card on the tray

though ink outside

is one drop blurred

already dry

it's not just the one instrument

the rain has come

it syncopates

makes anarchy of rhythm

it has fallen

no one heard it

no one saw

it was out of the dream

now we're shone

how we reach into the rain

and lift

green

for a sun

to know

as if below there must be Earth

the planet of sweet rain!

Rob Schackne #523 - Pomegranate

Pomegranate

Pomegranate
through a seed
why is it

so dark
she threads
the needle

her left hand
my mountain
who needs
a poetry of hell
november
in the rain
some silence
there was trance
some distance
shit doesn't 
make me
a scientist

Stuart Rawlinson #85 - Disappeared

The window was left open
words wore away
at the bare paper
pull the blinds
unscrew the top
set a timer to remind
you of missing action
sleep. dream
something besides
accentuated eyes
the bees caught in mesh
the hives unbuilt
a breeze rolls
up the half-cut hill
carrying a wordless message
and another poem
about nothing

Rob Schackne #522 - Osiris Has A Word (redux)

Osiris Has A Word

Plenty of chances
to get me on the phone
and test your nerve
never hit & miss
this shit is very lawless
twice roll the bones
hippopotamus and leopard

three times it's broken
the crocodiles are vicious
look at your road
built up bombed out
must've been dreaming
let me state it gently
fuck it up again
if pain's your thing
make me righteous
your heart is weighed
against the feather

Kit Kelen #686 - a clock for Magdalena Ball

686

a clock for Magdalena Ball

I'm looking into your clock again

it points all directions for me

it's the one horizon

globe shown flat

a city's in it

bid

times passes

sits up in the morning

you'll see

soft like a penis

when it's hard

the clock is always pointing

it's a warning

it's a lesson

the clock stings where it strikes

it's a map as well

of been and go

tricks stitches saving days

and makes the past

all go away

look

and it's now!

a camera catch

just air it turns

but we find it meaning

and under glass

sometimes shines

some sing

or chime

and a fist comes down

first thing in the morning

that's the clock to bits

how it was made of numbers once!

spun from oil

all tick and tock

the two of them!

portal of day

it is an ash whirl grey

all slough

the rocket stages fall

you find the wanting measure

you'll never have to remember the clock

it winds you wombwards

winds you up

the skin will show as well

but you'll need stronger glasses

thank God

yes it is a lesson

too late! too late!

it mainly says

rhymes days of the month

with an arrow

always falling short

the sun is set somewhere

but stay awake and stare it out

make moons of a mystery

sometimes the clock is flaming

or a noose until black rag

runs counter to our intuition

take the dog

stare wrist

tongues out for medicine

so tuned

grit drips

or something heaven slants

telling of the former age

you'd like to let go

clock's got a grip

tears through the dream plan

hands splash up

every circle is a clock to swim

all this in the same boat

set on

circumnavigation

there's one that blows up in your face

find right wire!

one ticks to dust

and here's the clock

that's rope to climb

have a heart

and try to beat as one

all under eternity's eye

soft like a poem

when it's opaque

see all our selves in there

Kit Kelen #685 - doggy

685

doggy

for Beth Spencer's Birthday 4 (or maybe 5)

I like to throw myself a stick

and fetch it back tomorrow

in dreams I'm burying

and have a fleece for gold

of all ages past, best the bones

it always takes time to be back

so roll on

slippery slobbery some days

black are some

untold with sorrow

for Beth Spencer's Birthday 4 (or maybe 5)

I like to throw myself a stick

and fetch it back tomorrow

chase a shadow

chase a tail

chase a fly around

just the one line

bark it out

around the ring

say tooth and claw

these are my special talent

legend of persistence, me

guard camp and fire ten thousand years

before that I run out of paws

is all I can remember

you'll find your way around the book

with my big ears

rug on the back seat

who doesn't moult?

or cage me

I'm a little lion

I'm not a cat for birthdays

and certain ones are mine

once in a moon must howl

and I like a wolfing down

lick the bowl till shine

for Beth Spencer's Birthday 4 (or maybe 5)

all innocent and look around

see me stretch - that's morning

I like to roll around in it

and take a splash for pond

love mud

and shake

stand by

you can reflect my glory

your road may be my mere appendage

draw joint too tight - you'll dick it

and there's how sometimes we get stuck

and bitch about it

(if you want more dogs...)

all innocent then look around

because we must kill time

a tail between the legs then

and yap yap yap

there might be rabbit

always something you can switch off

there -- that's better

bring me the biscuit

I'll sing

how once upon a Sputnik

saw what never dog has wished

I won't know the words yet

but a song is in the deeps of dog

I won't say die

or speak at all

to beg

you'll just sit up

it's one love

I'd lead the blind some times

hail fellows and well met

follow down at heel

and in the mouth hang

manger too

chase a fly

chase your shadow

chase myself around

I like to roll over for a rub

and nuzzle up

come pup

hither

let's be wild with the wind

and rain

whiff

follow trail

roll eyes

point ears

get by on a lift and sniff basis

slippery slobbery some days

black are some

untold with sorrow

please please

look up

look back for me

I like to throw myself a stick

and fetch it back tomorrow