I said in my most recent post that I would put up some poems soon. So, for those who enjoy my poetry, here are a few.
If you are reading on your phone, very important to turn your phone sideways, or the structure will be lost.
ROUND ROCK – KANGAROO ISLAND
The movement of a mighty mass subdued
How far have these gentle waves travelled
Yesterday this sparkling coolness lapping at my feet
was a towering swelling
supreme
and far from this sandy stretch on which I stand
Now like a man grown wiser at reaching his end
with the knowledge of its approaching
this sea is calm
and ebbs and flows with soft submission
But like us it will never cease to be
Man is matter
and matter is molecules
atoms
which cannot die
can only be diffused
rearranged
not ever erased
This next one was written whilst travelling through the Outback – near Boulia in South West Queensland. This region, at the time we were travelling Australia, had a strange energy about it, and probably always has. Perhaps before I share the poem, I will set the scene with an excerpt from my memoir –
‘It was dusk before we arrived in this town whose main street was reminiscent of a Jeffrey Smart painting – desolate – population nowhere to be seen. The only pub had lost its vital signs. Brown with outback dust and age, its dim light glowed from four small windows. No cars. I thought I heard a horse and cart, but it was only my mind surrendering to the place. Three to four hundred kilometres in any direction from the nearest town – Mount Isa, Winton or Birdsville, we were in Channel country – between The Diamantina and Simpson Desert – our small family just a speck in a wasteland.
We pulled into a small vacant piece of land near the pub and Warren walked the fifty metres across the unmade street to ask the publican if it was okay for us to camp there for the night. He and his one patron regarded Warren suspiciously and together gave their laconic permission.
(There’s more to the story here – to be found in my book – but will fast forward a bit).
Next morning we set off for Winton. We’d heard of a supernatural phenomenon that sometimes occurs on this track. Over decades the ‘Min Min’ lights have appeared to station owners and night travellers, dancing tauntingly just above the ground and out of reach, like playful ghosts.
As we drove through this spooky stretch, a monstrous ink black cloud rose ominously from the vast horizon behind us. The flat treeless landscape was alight with the might of the sun, engaged in an arm wrestle with the cloud. The country was soft with grasses as we drove along the hard track that we knew would become impassable with rain. The great rolling mass of thunder snapped at our heels. Like running from a tornado, we kept just ahead of the rain.
So, my poem which was written the night before, is about the wind that crept around us as we camped in this eerie place.
BOULIA WIND
Your voice has the wisdom of time
and tells me of loneliness
unending wanderings
You swoop between boundaries
of bleak burdened skies and warm compact earth
and brutally tear at my peace of mind
You seethe and you wail
like a ghost telling tales
and you whisper
in waves of feigned innocence
I like your secrets
your stories imagined
but Mystical Wind you’re mocking me
telling me my journey’s not even begun
Yes I know
that though you have your boundaries
those of earth and sky
mine are more confining
I will never see it all
I am not God
or you Boulia Wind
Here’s one more. As I’m trawling through my files, I am beginning to realise that, while there are still plenty of poems I haven’t shared here, they are dated. (Does poetry date?). I think I am about to embark on a new phase – writing in the key of now.
So one last one from the seventies –
THE PENDULUM
Touch the earth
I must taste it
lay upon it
feel it
know its rhythm
Chameleon-clothed I enter in
I am part of a borderless painting
I am a blade of grass that bends with the wind
and I am spectator
I see the cosmic picture
see an atom moving where it must
with only the bounds that confine it to the cell
that is contained in an organism
within The Earth
within this galaxy
within this universe
with ONLY those bounds
I am suspended
in a divine order of things
I am free of decisions
How big am I
in this infinite spiral of being
How small
I am an ant in a crystal ball
a fish in a sea with edges
a word in an unread book
a babe in an untended cradle
I love reading the sea poems of others. How inspiring it must be to live on the coast with the sea in all its moods ever present. My environment is the South Australian countryside that has always been my inspiration. But I now want to branch out into the human condition, into the stories that are always being created for us – by our choices, or just as importantly, by accident. Charles Bukowski’s poetry seems fictional but I’m sure is based on his experiences, people and places he has known. For now I want him to be my muse.
THE DINER
She sat at a table for two in the racket and clatter of the restaurant on Harriet Drive
across from her a child
thin and fragile as a porcelain cup
plucked from faraway poverty by those themselves needing rescue
She did not look at the child
or speak
instead an iPhone an extension of her arm
The boy engrossed in the iPad brought for his comfort
and his mother’s separateness
The woman’s yellow hair was piled on top of her head
like a dish of scrambled eggs
put up there in a hurry
with strands escaping
though not attractively
She might have been attractive had she
even for a moment
looked up
or spoken
She ate
from a fork held American style in her chubby right hand
phone on the table
her neck craned a little to keep reading
watching
left-hand typing
the fork stabbing at food
not always successful
Eyes never on the plate
Several stabs at times before achieving food
But there was a rhythm
stab stab
clunk clunk as the fork hit the plate
stab stab
food in mouth
chewing slowly
eyes on phone
The child
sleepy as a baby cat
dropped his head onto the ‘Pad
Slid off his chair
The mother
alerted by a tug at her arm
without a word or glance
lifted him onto the narrow ledge of her lap
one meaty arm securing the child from falling
The eating rhythm didn’t falter
stab miss
stab food
chew
No eyes on the meal
The boy asleep in seconds
The mother groping
lastly
for a bowl of lettuce leaves
easier to blindly stab than meat
a bowl of crunch with dressing
no reaction
just food
one-handed
going in
eyes on phone
A purse-lipped waitress
wound tightly as a wind-up toy
sped with purpose
around the tables
Almost tripped on the sparkly shoe
protruding
from the mother child table
protruding
intruding into the invisibly defined
work space
The kitchen clattered in plain sight
The room was raucous with more wine
A fat lady laughed operatically
and for a second stopped the room
A boy
early twenties
adjusted his pink bow tie across from his plain-dressed brother
Two girls with them awkward in their backless cleavage-showing tops
An older couple
Second-time-arounders
in comfortable clothes
touched hands
They listened
talked
They ate
They drank
They watched
They left
Went home
She wrote a poem
Hmm. I might have done it. A poem about the human condition, behaviour.
I will put up another blog end of month. We’ve been to a jazz festival, and visited some long lost friends. More to tell.
Till then, take care.
Warmly,
Sue
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