hope this finds you
There are countless articles online that say dreaming of emails springs from needing to contact ppl irl.
There are countless articles online that say dreaming of emails springs from needing to contact ppl irl.
gums in headlights
mum drives home
after many wines
and one coffee
gums in headlights
mum drives home
after many wines
and one coffee
empty country roads
swerving for fun
cassette up loud
searching for mopoke
every silver tree
cold backseat wearing
her big jumper
maybe we will
never get home
It’s taken me years to realise greymatter
can harm just as much
as any grassfire.
It’s taken me years to realise greymatter
can harm just as much
as any grassfire.
Learning to sit in water’s blush, the push &
pull of it. Some days it’s like trying
to communicate with someone
long dead in a dream.
The closer your hand gets
the further mine pulls away.
The thing I’m not telling you
is for as long as I can remember some
thing has sat on my chest, tried to strangle
me
& it has failed.
either poetry is back! again
or a malicious state-based actor launched a cyber attack
on australianpoetrys servers
this was the year i changed my bio from writer to poet
this could be our year we said
id won a prize and youd come into form
so we submitted two poems each to the anthology
best australian poems 2022
there had been an open call
three poems each was the limit but we were being humble
we waited to hear back
we were chill about it
the top 100 poems in the land
a big deal
but no big deal
we are just upstarts
we really want to get in tho
someone said theyd received 5000 submissions
thank u editors for your labour
5000! G-WHIZ
either poetry is back! again
or a malicious state-based actor launched a cyber attack
on australianpoetrys servers
laugh all you want BUT
some regimes, those with long memories, know that
poetry is a weapon
know that the revolution is linguistic
know that poetry fractures regimes
plato knew
and the despots know too
i often think of
turkeys national poet nazim hikmet
a communist in a nato country
he died in soviet exile
turkey used him up for the secular revolution then jailed him and jailed him and drove him away
revoked his citizenship then restored it after hed died
fifty years later
i sat and wrote in a cultural centre named in his honour made of stone and timber
there was a drama school
a tea garden under tall trees
they sold books in turkish, russian and spanish
people were always writing there, studying, pondering, speaking and listening with their whole
bodies, wielding big ideas everyday
they talk now of journalists in jail
but no one mentions the poets anymore
remember Lorca, Neruda and others
somewhere poets still go to jail, get killed
here they send poets to university
poets as tinkerers and bureaucrats
poetry as pathology, as ornate junk, poetry not seen at all
since settler capitalism, in its plunder
could not be bothered to take it, to absorb it
to list it on the exchange
and so WE pick it up, use it, our weaponry
poets as guerillas
waiting for our acceptance emails
i can attest
that the mobilisation is linguistic
riffs poems chants graffiti are the oxygen of revolt
solidarity is sung and punned into minds and lands
it happens at home, in schools, in work, in publics, tea gardens, mountains
i was there in istanbul at the siege of gezi park
in the crowd that resisted then seized bulldozers
dodged water canons and withstood tear gas
we sung of revolution, we practiced it
a newfangled oneness
that disastered the legitimacy of the government
and opened a horizon of possibility
that ten years later becomes the end of not only a tyrant
but the tyrannical mode
all ours liberations are bound up in one another
when we are not killing we might be healing
believe me when i tell you that i found my voice then
a mass movement refusing the authorities that govern everyday life
saying we can do it ourselves
by the people for the people we the people
i think that
best australian poems 2021 was a bumper year
cos it had that energy
we love that edition
you bought it for my birthday but i already had it
we sung its praises to all
at the bookshop i sold dozens
wrote a shelf-talker saying
‘to everyone who reads or wants to read poetry
this is the place to start
100 poems from all walks of the continent
theres radical stuff going on’
i say this now because i felt proud for poetry!
for us
strange to say it but honest
no document i can imagine would speak to the state of this troubled nation better
and so when you were in melb housesitting my place
and i was at the salvos in alice springs
i lit up when i found 2009 and 2013 for two bucks each
leni shilton written in blue ink on the first page
i read them right away, loved them
thought of leni, thank u leni
ill buy your book too
there was something special about encountering 2021
dedicated to my friend and teacher the great Ania Walwicz
the editors did an excellent job
the poets of course did too
and maybe it came at the right time for me, morale was high
or maybe poetry is the technology that generates joys and agonies most freely and directly now
the marginalised poet can storm the top 100
difference in the charts
in a way that the sculptor, the film director, the musician
might not
we feel like were in permanent crisis
its post-truth and plato changed his mind
called us back
the social body exhausted
the earth in arrears
poetry is needed
a jolt straight in the vein
poetry, my friend
poetry
the modern office is post-cubicle / friday is losing its cultural relevance / if you’re never really ‘on’ you can never really be ‘off’
this is the poem from my dream I say / office hours are a myth / publishing poems is money for
nothing / the supermarket is both under and over policed / today the first thing I said was ‘shut
up’ (cat) / possible upsides to a pandemic include the death of musicals / possible downsides
include the personal essay / publishing poems is printing money but the money is bad / I’ve
found this year that I’m a betting man / you could chase me down the street but where would I
go / I’d like to write a poem in the style of ‘Scott 4’ / but how can you / maybe only via legacy /
don’t trust the morning to do the evening’s work / I am absolved by my position at the desk / I
am freed by my duty of care / publishing poems is money in the bank / reading poems is time off
the clock / my afternoon is my employer’s / my fingers are my own / who dictates the roll
economy / 2 kids = time off in lieu / turn poetry into stocks / by sitting here I am winning / I am
luckier than most / there are no doubt those who would kill for this mousepad / but does the
reverse apply / two factor authentication is a misnomer / there are three factors and the third is
yourself / your desire to log in / possible upsides to working from home include increased
productivity / possible downsides include lockable doors / work in its purest form is art / labour in
essence is love / I am forgiven by my reputation as an entrepreneurial spirit / of what I’m still
unsure / today outside is ferocious / ulcers are mysterious with none of mystery’s romance /
no-one ‘gets’ the shop anymore / are personal printers ‘back’ or ‘out’ / the only conscionable
thing is to have nothing to show for a week’s work & a blank cv / in what way are we trending /
could we get a report on that / I am still a young man / I am making a difference / up the garden
path is still a viable pathway / being here negates the possibility of being there / publishing
poems looks good on a resume / can we push our 2 to 4 / our 4 to tomorrow / ergonomics can
be a spiritual practice if you let it / plants are an acceptable worry / there is nothing more
interesting than weather / to buy a scanner is to understand Marx’s theory of the commodity / to
send a fax is to understand purity / possible upsides to a volatile market include a sense of
adventure / possible downsides include losing everything / by taking up this space I am useful /
my presence is internally monetized / what appears to be a choice is often no choice at all / for
example: ink / by writing this poem I am ‘taking back’ / but the poem is only anti-capital when
secret / this is good for employers / a clean desk is a happy desk / I am driven by my tendency
to help / a problem shared is the terrain of the consultant / a problem halved is one of countless
outcomes / would it be more tedious to stop or continue / do you archive or remember / how to
measure ethics on a matrix / the modern office is post-cubicle / friday is losing its cultural
relevance / if you’re never really ‘on’ you can never really be ‘off’ / I am on track to meet my
goals / this provides some comfort / the colour of a lanyard can tell you everything / this office
block is over 100 years old / but what of the soil beneath that / or beneath that again / a good
worker has a clear trajectory / often this requires obstacles to be cleared / I am embarking on a new chapter / I am realigning my values / Heraclitus’ theory of the break room / HR’s theory of
culture / publishing poems is an act of inflation / a sunny day has economic implications / a clear
commute is a glimpse at divinity / morale is a budgetable cost / possible upsides to a restructure
include increased efficiency / possible downsides include clearing your desk / this is the poem
from my dream I say / a good worker is like a tree / inherently removable
└── one-last-time
└── the-networked-streets-float-in-liminal-space
├── go-east
│ └── watch-the-last-of-the-cyan-light-ascend-to-the-skybox
│ ├── stand-inside-the-graveyard-of-holographic-ghosts
│ └── while-the-dull-piano-laments-travellers-lost
├── go-north
│ ├── an-altar
│ │ └── a-moss-covered-rostrum
│ │ ├── curious-decaying-stone
│ │ ├── the-muted-obelisk-withered-down-to-its-stone-feet
│ │ └── traverse-the-corroded-paths
│ │ └── pattered-footsteps-leave-no-trace
│ │ └── on-leaf-matter-floorboards
│ └── one-last-time
│ └── the-networked-streets-float-in-liminal-space
└── breathe-life-into-the-corroded-path
├── go-south
│ ├── an-empty-shell
│ │ ├── a-muted-elegy
│ │ │ └── an-epitaph
│ │ │ └── farewell-to-a-cold-server
│ │ │ └── so-long-isometric-home
│ │ ├── ghosts-emerge-from-the-shattered-egg
│ │ └── stress-fractured-broken-heart
│ │ ├── paths-dead-ended
│ │ │ └── no-bars-left
│ └── this-way-this-way-this-way
│ ├── this-ecosystem-born-from-bits
│ ├── this-low-synthetic-scream
│ ├── this-low-thrum-of-an-empty-spaceport
│ └── this-short-buzz-of-an-interstellar-vehicle
│ └── echoes-endlessly-into-hyper-sleep
└── go-west
└── get-lost
└── reclaim-the-path
└──-captured-by-roots-and-dust
├── until-the-horizon-spills-past-the-browser-edge
│ └── lie-amongst-the-tangled-drone
│ └── inside-astro-turfed-pixelated-home
├── find-the-warmth-of-a-small-dying-flame
└── beyond-the-abandoned-warehouse-home
└── walk-until-the-moss-worn-obelisk-begins-to-croak
└── build-a-new-path-beside-its-ghost
The more I say I write poetry, the less I express it, and so in a container of salted water, I saturate my pages for tomorrow’s absence.
‘a moment’s unrecoverable banishment of self’—Evelyn Lau
In whatever era this finds you—I am out of my depth. The more
I say I write poetry, the less I express it, and so in a container
of salted water, I saturate my pages for tomorrow’s absence.
Inside the mist of living without death there is the accumulation
of living with death and the lure of drama, barbed assumptions,
the only way it goes—is drama. Natural versus man-made injuries—
as if tragedy allows for transferable roles and the glorious thrill
of gorging on the banquet that is your own body. No one has ever
wanted to consume me like this, and one must be composed
when both guest and host. Heritage-listed façades in the foreground,
assemblies in the background. The common areas of the complex,
in order of appearance—the entrance, the hallways, several
outdoor-facing windows, and the laundry. Letters to outline
measures of permitted distances—as if adoration could be restricted.
My account allows for building poems, not a house. Wipe a finger
along the dusty plaster of a wall and rub the powder over your eyelids.
If possible, leave your home during allocated hours, blink
as a reminder you still own secrets and must harness the gift to lie.
A circulated memo updates the limits of imagination before it falls
into predictability or magical thinking. I am cushioned in pursuing
experiences from written scripts as you ache in a pre-arranged room
for a statement to be recorded after the accident—your dry mouth
craving for slippage. The fever of this scene heats—like love, endless
love, rumoured to be as expected as flesh. Since there were no physical
injuries after the collision you must form and sustain a narrative,
a statement for insurance. I sit and visualise the rising and falling of
your chest. My cruelty heaves as I relate such undulations to thoughts.
*Note: This poem was originally commissioned and published by Running Dog in 2021 (https://rundog.art/poetry/to-be-consumed-in-something-rather-than-by-it-autumn-royal/) and the above version was reprinted in The Drama Student, Giramondo, 2023.
I follow the birth of fire through the wilds. The lacuna is lined with fable and milk. Bone marrow flowers in the howls.
I carry water in an earthen vessel. The jug is made from earth beneath the palash. I follow the birth of fire through the wilds. The lacuna is lined with fable and milk. Bone marrow flowers in the howls. There is a white swan by the lacuna. I will barter with the swan. Paramahamsa. The Supreme Swan. In my vessel is volcanic ash, lizard skin and burning cloves. It rains for the first time in this green village. I carry rainwater in an earthen vessel. The painter lines the lacuna with copper and wine. He is doubled over with an arched spine, like an Agnes Varda gleaner. He renders an image of the dictator with the thread from his mouth. The dictator stands under the palash, with Camel cigarettes in his pocket and a crow tattoo on his throat. The dictator weeps into an earthen vessel. The painter changes into a swan to flee the bowels of fictions. I carry the weeping dictator, swan and lacuna in an earthen vessel. The vessel returns to the earth as a thousand centipedes. The centipedes change into seeds for the workers to plant: anjeer, plantain, baobab.
Why do you want to be the best? Is that because you are a lack or there is a lack in you that you feel like filling up all the time? Even when you are named the best, does that mean anything?
You have to do it badly. If it is poetry, even more so, because there is no because. If you write like you were the best in the world, you are the worst because you pretend too hard. Too harsh, too. Why do you want to be the best? Is that because you are a lack or there is a lack in you that you feel like filling up all the time? Even when you are named the best, does that mean anything? What about those who are not named the best? What about those who are not even called the good? Do we have to be good in order to survive? Survive what? But poetry is freedom. It frees you from all the constraints, restraints and limitations of the world because of good, better, best. It doesn’t work like that in poetry. When you tell yourself to write the best poem in the world now, you will not get anywhere. You won’t even produce a single line. Best is the symbol of the worst oppression and suppression. It stops you from even producing the mediocrest work. Why don’t you say to yourself: I’m not good enough. I’m already bad. From time to time, I feel I have no abilities to do anything well. I am stifled by the competition around me. Everyone is pushed to a choking level. I don’t want to be a president, not even of a company, not even a class, let alone a country. All I ever want to do is a poet. And a bad poet at that. Why? I mean who can be that good without making a huge effort? And the point? Nothing guarantees that you won’t die. In fact everything guarantees that you do. I write without knowing what I write is good or bad. I write without wanting to know. Anything and everything are subject to judgement by other people anyway. Who has the autonomy to do what one likes to the ultimate degree of pleasing oneself? Why does one imprison oneself with the concepts, ideas, ideologies, judgments and confinements of other people? Aren’t there too many prisons already in this world? To be bad is to be free. To be bad is to be creative. To be bad is to be innovative. Marcel Duchamp is bad because he buys a readymade and presents it as art in a museum. Piero Manzoni is bad because he cans his own shit and sells it for millions of dollars after his death. Andres Serrano is bad because he makes ‘Piss Christ.’ Michael Jackson is bad because he makes an album titled, Bad. Maurizio Cattelan is bad because he creates Comedian out of a duck-taped banana. Banksy is bad because he self-destructs his own art. Ouyang Yu is bad because he writes a poem called ‘Bad Writing’. All histories are a continuous process of badness against goodness until it becomes good then badded again. It’s a process of keep saying ‘my bad’, ‘our bad’, ‘their bad’. I love bad. There’s nothing else I love. I only love bad. Let the good rot for all I care.
I sing of broken shackles, leaving
overripened plains for dunes
I sing in languages I cannot speak
a tangle of overlapping tongues
teasing threads of different textures
spun from the same source
I sing in بھاشا
بولی
زبان
all
sprung from the same soil,
the same ache, I sing
of داتا
دستگیر
پیر
font of spirit and marrow-deep
desire, path to وجد where all
language is one I sing bells
around a camel’s throat
as seekers sing while beating
begging bowls in time
to their ڈاچی’s rolling steps
I sing of broken shackles, leaving
overripened plains for dunes
I sing of devotion, renunciation
so sweet the burning sands turn
supplicant I sing my hands aching
for a ڈھولکی, my feet for dancing bells
golden گھنگرو to sound each step
the song circling to the beginning
where the پیر was always waiting
Transliteration
I Sing
I sing in languages I cannot speak
a web of overlapping tongues
tantalising threads of different textures
spun from the same source
I sing in bhasha, boli, zabaan all
sprung from the same soil carrying
the same ache I sing
of datah, dastgir, pir,
font of spirit and marrow-deep
desire, path to vajd where all
language is one I sing bells
around a camel’s throat sounding
as seekers sing beating begging bowls
in time to their dachi’s rolling steps
I sing of broken shackles of leaving
the overripened plains for the dunes
I sing of devotion, renunciation
so sweet the burning sands turn
supplicant I sing my hands aching
for a dholki, my feet for dancing bells
golden ghungroo to sound each step
the song circling back to the beginning
where the pir was always waiting
Glossary
bhasha, boli, zabaan: ‘Language’ in Bhraj Bhasha, Hindustani, and Urdu, respectively, though all are understood in Urdu.
datah, dastgir, pir: Words used almost interchangeably when referring to Sufi spiritual teachers, derived from different languages. Datah is one who is revered and loved, dastgir is literally someone who holds one’s hand, and pir is guide/saint/master/teacher
vajd: spiritual ecstasy
dachi: female camel
dholki: two-headed skin drum
ghungroo: a string or strap of bells tied around a dancer’s ankles. Seen mostly in Indian Classical dance.