Macquarie Marshes

Macquarie Marshes

Parched flat once grassy terrain

To the horizon distant

Water starved marsh wonderland

In prolonged drought persistent

Jigsaw creeks now dehydrated

Silent and deserted

Migrant vacationers to other routes

Eternally diverted

A quietness so like the end of time

Enveloping the marsh

Having stolen all animal wild life

In retribution harsh

For man’s betrayal of the bush

In slowing up the flow

Of distant lifeblood river systems

Created long ago

With damns, bores, canals and salt

Into the years beyond

A birthplace now only of hope

For nature to respond.

 

 

 

 

 

Looking Out Looking In

 

Looking Out Looking In

Like static distant vistas through the window of a speeding train

life simply passes by.

A rushing tunnel of darkness coerces self reflection most arcane

but easy to deny.

The brazen image focused at a metre merely mirrors the disdain

I see in my minds eye.

Satisfying to complete another day but this mediocre life profane

is still a living lie.

Unable to see value in remaining here with nothing much to gain

yet I’m afraid to die.

Am I then fated to continue to exist in introverted moods inane

nil effort to comply.

See visions of radiated ones in a hospice in Chernobyl the Ukraine 

tears welling in my eye.

A world beckons beyond the raucous chatter of cockatoos insane

mocking me in the sky.

Dare I taste the piquant flavour of the devil’s daily curry once again

of course I have to try

To seek fulfillment and in my personal esteem, higher levels to attain                                myself to dignify. 

 

 

Night Flight

Night Flight

Tonight the air feels strange, not cold, in fact, not even cool

Unusually warm for Sydney in July, Australian Yule,

A perfect night for viewing stars, cloudless, clear and pure

Unspoilt by man’s pollution, no smoke haze to endure

And airport curfews now in place ensure a sky sublime

Pregnant silence coats the land like a Marcel Marceau mime.

Above the regal moon, so full, sits low in elevation,

Infuses mood, instils a sense of eerie expectation.

Peering from behind tall trees promoting shape and shadow

Furtive profiles on the land, lurking late night tableaux.

Such aura from the moonlight evokes weird scenes theatric

A world of two dimensions, a shadow-graph dramatic,

Immobile trees and buildings, flat silhouettes outlined

Robbed of girth and colour just in monochrome defined.

A breeding ground for creative minds, night under attack,

Lost souls and ghouls, a shaman, all shades of black on black,

Intensify the ambient mood as the nimbus rises higher

Flooding the earth with ghostly beams, nocturnal silver fire.

To all intents and purposes there is no night time breeze

Just a hint, a puff, a zephyr stirs high branches in the trees,

Quaintly moulds mixed mind shapes from hallucinogenic fronds

Fomenting fear and panic when a fertile brain responds

As one bold rustling mind shape, hanging high, takes flight

With powerful strokes of webbed skin into the dark of night

Its form quite imperceptible until its moon traverse

Revives foyer poster memories, a Transylvanian curse,

A horror movie cliché now transposed to local skies

Stark and black and potent uttering ultrasonic cries,

That pulse like radar signals across this heavenly stage

Directional technology born of a primitive age.

With strident shrieks this leader bat now signals its cohorts

In manner urgent drawing a shrill chorus of retorts

From shadowy shapes on branches, in querulous debates

Of fever pitch crescendo, which then suddenly abates,

Arrested on command as flapping leather flays the air

Their leader has directed an alternate night time lair

That generates a chilling, but unusual, local sight

A flurry of flying foxes taking off in mass night flight. 

 

 

 

As The Dust Settles

This one was based on an unsavory accident in 1997 when the ACT government demolished the old hospital on the edge of Lake Burley Griffin in Canberra. Thousands lined the lakeside to watch but the explosives were incorrectly set and flying debris littered the lake, reached the far shore and killed one poor little girl. Sad, very sad.

As The Dust Settles

As the dust settles

media moths migrate 

en masse, 

attracted from the capitol, 

wild accusations 

like shrapnel fly, 

imploding the myth 

of Sunday by the shore, 

lake’s shores 

safe shores 

Lake Burley Grieving, 

ask whose is the shame, 

ask whose is the blame?

As the dust settles

back peddling 

politicians nit pick 

the community picnic, 

conceived of 

mass marketers 

now counting 

their electoral cost; 

old union heads, 

after the event, 

wax wise in lament 

of such cost effective, 

but non traditional 

solutions; oh yes, 

and dangerous too.

As the dust settles 

over the shattered 

sanatorium, 

once life’s savior 

now turned harbinger of death 

in its own deck of cards 

demolition demise, 

keen sighted 

legal eagles 

hover above the carrion 

that was Canberra’s child, 

but the dead 

will not arise 

from class actions, 

even on the third day.

 

 

History

 

History

when a word can recount the full story

when a tear can flood the whole world

and a sigh, a breath fierce storms provoke

yet our flag of life remains furled;

when a dream disappears in an inkling

when a sliver seems mountain size

and the flame of your candle flickers

free in the instant before it dies;

when a glance can engender a pageant

when silence can sweetly serenade

and moonlight at dawn in dappled skies

is the catalyst for our love’s crusade;

where an echo fades before its return

where two parallel lines intersect

we dwell in the rhyme of my poetry

through that mirror, darkly, we reflect.

 

 

The Doorway

 

The Doorway

Faint breezes puff impotently at the heavy metal security gate,

but only rattle the loosely latched wooden door behind;

two currawongs, couched high in council's potted jacarandas,

warble their musical morning alarums in perfect counterpoint,

their echoes eerily climb the graffiti clad concrete stairwell

cross sensory paths with aromatic coffee and crunchy bacon

sliding stealthily under the door, wafting out to the unlit mall;

lazily, dawn drags the dank cloak of darkness from the doorway.

Despair, in various guises, played, worked and slept here last night;

uniformed hope and charity did their very best to coddle fallen kin,

but even now, as dawn's first light floods the cold concrete floor,

one shivering legacy of the dark side's frantic trade, curls up

foetus tight in unconscious mental bondage amongst the bed mates

of her addiction, discarded syringes, heroin caps, tablets and the

crumpled condoms, her credit card in the alternate economic society;

poignantly, her life now poised on the point of a state issued needle.

 

 

Bush Anthem For Australia

 

Bush Anthem For Australia

(As read nightly for the last eighty years at the Mount’n Lagoon pub!)

 

With just a snatch of light remaining from a perfect autumn day

observe the cloudless sky continuum of red through ginger, then dark grey

which last lights the lofty eucalypt with its cockatoo congregation

reflective sun turns white to red faking a tree born conflagration.

Its a special time and to welcome night catch nature’s form of praise

as a poignant Aussie chorus forms to farewell the best of days;

there’s poor cohesion, lack of harmony, voices laced with some discord

but prize your days in this unique land and accept this aural reward.

To some its just dusk, crickets chirping and cockies ceaseless squawking

but drink it in, its the spirit of our great land that’s really talking

and it only takes a second for the cloak of darkness to descend

and bring the resonance of Australia abruptly to an end.

Keep these idyllic scenes eternal, help our land to long survive

love our people, love our fauna and learn to keep the bush alive,

believe in the spirit of nature, keep faith with natural ways

entrust your god with the power to deliver such perfect days.