reflections

The colour of light

Lightning breaks in the night sky

the white light alien to the yellow light of the sun

That lightning exists in other parts of the universe

makes me think of the unbelievable existence of life on this world.

She was perfect for him

and they showed it on instagram

and then she left him.

The speed with which she changed her facebook status from in a relationship

to single

hurt him more than he thought it could.

He went to work, he told himself it would be a new start

but it was empty for a while

then he sat out and watched the lightning and the night sky light up

and it reminded him that lightning occurs all across this world.

It was a train ticket out of his home town and the start of something new.

Night air

I don’t know if I’ve got it in me tonight

The same streets and shops

The same faces

The sunny day, the rainy day

The health and sickness.

I stand by the supermarket and watch the rain fall off the roof and puddle in the car park

I wonder where to from here.

The night comes

The street lights

It’s still raining.

The saddest I’ve been is standing outside a mattress and bed shop

At 2 am

Looking at the beds on display.

1840

Six am was the first bell

Roll up the bedding and put it on the third shelf

Fifteen minutes later, the second bell

And we would all step out of our rooms.

It was cold in winter, so cold you thought you would die.

Summer was better, but we worked longer days.

We would exercise, eat breakfast, be spoken to

And then by nine am we would be expected to start work.

I, taking up my tools, would chisel at the sandstone and the limestone

Making building blocks out in the reclaimed land of the yard.

There was a team with me, many apprentices but mostly skilled men. 

He would say, “Does that make sense? Do you understand?” Until I hated him.

That bully of a man. He bullied some worse than others. 

A working party came by with axes and shovels on their way to clear the churchyard.

One boy, thin, yellow looking, 

Took an axe and caved the bully’s head in. The boy said, “That should end it,” and they took him away.

It solved my problem. But the boy was later hanged. 

I noticed the blood pool on the ground underneath the dead man.

They took the body away;  we continued our work.

At twelve, we had dinner and a break, then went back to work for the afternoon. 

Before supper, I stopped and watched the afternoon sun in the giant trees.  

At night, the last bell ringing at 9 pm

I was alone with my thoughts. 

The guard walks about with slippers. 

I hear the padding of his feet

He wants to catch us doing wrong. 

In a year, I’ll be gone. I’ll head to Hobart and work stone.

It won’t take long. 

The night has a demon

A dark, dangerous spirit that travels at midnight.

2 and 3 am are the most dangerous times

When breathing is difficult and panic sets in

Eyes open, looking out windows at a city bathed in black

And yellow street lights.

The demon is there

Dragging its feet by your bedroom window

Possessing you with a madness to fly out of bed

To run out into the street

To clutch at your throat to get a breath

Silence, blindness, terror

 it is the night hour of death and lunacy

Of loneliness 

Of the fear of death

Waiting for morning

And the yellow-gold light

To chase the monster away.

Mornings

I am always the second to wake in the morning
The room dark
I hear the footsteps in the hall
And half awake, I hope it’s not six a.m.
But it is always six a.m.

The house is cold.
I find the button for the gas heater in the still-dark hall and
Pressing it, instantly hot air pours forth from vents in the ceiling.
When I was a boy, there was no heat in the mornings before school
No one had time to light the fire.
So, I would linger in bed, hoping to be forgotten.

Later, when I was a little older, we had a black and white TV in the kitchen
Where I could watch a cartoon as I ate breakfast
And wish away these days of school and rising early.

At nights, bus riding and walking in wet streets of stinging cold
I would light the fire if I were first home.
There I would fall asleep beside it.
Once, a spark caught my school jacket and burned a hole in it.

There is little in that now
But my father grew up in a house without a bathroom
His father was without electricity.
What would a child know of these things now?
And yet, happy moments were found.

Age

The clouds parted

and like light through the trees,

the sun danced around the puddles

shining like coins on the wet, shiny stones.

My legs hurt from sitting down all day

and I didn’t feel well

I was too fat

and the less I did the lazier I became.

The oval was wet

and the heels of my boots sunk into the muddy grass

and I remembered when I was a boy

that I loved to wade through puddles and sink into mud.

I was so thin when I was young,

and full of energy

but I could sleep for 12 hours straight too if I wanted.

Those times seem lost now,

gone cheaply

as if I took fifteen years of my life and set them on fire.

Visions of clay and dust

At 5:03am I have visions of 5:04,

The alarm clock shines out green in the night

And someone has broken the glass behind which the electronic numbers shine

The cracks like spiderwebs, glisten

As I wait for the numbers to change.

On the St. Kilda pier yesterday

I picked up a starfish that had been left to die on a bench by a fisherman

I peeled him off the cold wood and held his sticky body

And wondered if he were alive,

Then I dropped him over the side into the black water

And he sunk slowly

Like a dream disappearing into the clouds. 

I read in the newspaper of some fool

Who broke his leg in New York 

And boasted he could drink like Ernest Hemingway

And that he sat in a bar New York the night his leg snapped

Slumped over a drink opposite David Lowy

That airplane millionaire.

At 5:03, it makes me think of money

And investing.

An oil man stands in my mind

Telling me he has been broke 4 times and is now richer than ever

“Borrow money, put it in the share market” he roars “what could go wrong?

If you should bust, go again, who cares?”

It is still 5:03. 

A woman laughs about how clever she is

Her daughter writes of the pain of love

A man with a pencil thin beard and a ludicrously large baseball cap

Is nodding silently in a bar.

I can see him from my window. 

“Borrow that money and put it all on shares” the oil man yells

“Wait outside women’s toilets and ask them to go to bed with you…”

 

Still it is 5:03 and the world is crazy.

The world is always crazy at the end of a minute.

I picture 5:04 and the peace it will bring.  

Rushing fire

Pack it away with the toys and the books,

those days of dreaming.

The dark stain on the rug pushed under an old chair

that spews dust with every pat.

A scream from under the fridge,

milk running down the door and drying in a neat puddle.

A text from a friend saying ‘don’t worry about me’

Delete

an email for a sale on now.

Light a candle and fall asleep,

wait for another hand to snuff the flame,

a lover’s hand,

the candle burns to a nub and smoke drifts gently to the ceiling

a black mark.

Remember the handshake where he held your hand too tightly, for too long

And remember the dream where standing in your backyard,

your saw a mushroom cloud rising in the south

and you pray that it is far enough away that you are not killed

by the rushing fire.

 

Apartment building on 347 Favoux Street

The clerk working in the bank

Itching his legs under the desk and getting up to go the bathroom

For the third time this hour.

He walks home after work.

It has been raining and water pools on the footpath

And drips from the shop awnings.

 

At home, he stands in his kitchen and heats up

A packet of noodles.

Outside it begins to rain again and his little window mists over.

The water boils in the saucepan slowly,

Like a bath.

 

He has talked his neighbour into going out with him.

She is a small woman, with a friendly smile.

He meets her at her front door,

She is wearing a blue dress with blue buttons

He is wearing a brown polo shirt.

He takes her to the movies.

Afterwards, they walk along the pier

And eat spiralised potatoes.

 

She tells him about her last boyfriend,

And how he drank too much

He listens with a pretend interest,

Hiding his annoyance.

Back in her apartment

She puts a movie on Netflix

And they sit down to watch for a while,

Until yawning, she asks him to come into the bedroom

And they have sex.

He leaves at two am

Feeling the dampness that the night brings

And the dampness that this kind of love brings

And he sleeps a deep sleep

That only the numb can sleep.

In the morning he wakes late and has to rush to work.

She wakes late, and not having to start work until the afternoon

She takes a bath.

She makes it as hot as she can

And watches the clouds through the skylight

And wonders what the day will bring.

Calmly she thinks about last night;

As if youth lasted forever.