VOLUME X – BOOK I

Seek The True Lie of the Land

1.	Hear the true lie of the land -
tired myths that cloak the landscape,
leave souls stuck as if on fly paper,
enough truth to make things stick,
with some grit like sand underfoot,
yet flash with a sheen that lets slip 
all those who try to grab
what simply cannot be grasped…

Noble savages, civilized pioneers,
honest greenies, politicians with vision,
this country has a constitution,
some backbone, call it determination,
born from solitude
blown in from the desert…

See the true lie of the land -
views from cityscapes retranslated,
on the maps rivers as roads,
fragile swamps as village ponds,
urban bush as mere backyards,
mountain slopes as hills with a view,
forest blocks with fire trails
named, or numbered, like streets…

Which history is taught, which songs sung,
what do we have in common 
is not much more than that,
even then would you join in,
dance at a Greek wedding,
spend all day in a black man’s seated circle..?

Seek the true lie of the land -
belief’s a moulded mindscape,
just that, just this, I sadly sigh, alas,
in worlds shared, pre-constructed,
like nomads wandering no-man’s land,
like a snail without a home struggling on 
forgetting there’s one carried 
on our back, on our back…

Britain will protect us, and the Yanks,
all Asians speak with one Chinese tongue,
sandy blackmen want all the land,
newspapers speak the truth,
it’s all printed there in black and white…
if only you would read between the lines,
understand….

2.	Bearded buddha 
on a motorbike
with his skinny moll,
his yogini,
all dressed up
in deadly black
with leather cap,
driving up 
the boulevard,
obviously lovers,
surely, having seen
the emptiness
beneath the camouflage,
beneath the skin,
finding the force
that drives them,
has them cycling along
as one….

3.	I’m a cigarette baby
born from a smoking mum;
a bit too short in the fuse,
must huff and puff my way upstairs,
am want to make a mess,
and at the end of the day,
don’t laugh, must confess,
I’m too big in the butt
with a skin paper thin
too easily branded by the sun….

4.	Two straight-looking guys 
fresh from the gym, not long showered,
in blue-jean shorts, white cotton shirts,
are seated at an outside coffee table taking tea,
one of them, for a few seconds, is stroking the knee
of his talking friend who was discreetly grinning,
nervously laughing, a little, out loud….

5.	He missed the bus
and now he waits,
leaning up against 
a rectangular wall
like some ad 
from Playboy, or Playgirl:
a tall, slim, trendy guy
dressed in summer whites,
in paper thin, skin-tight pants,
with flaming blond hair
cut quite short, except on top;
where it is streaked 
with a vivid, glowing,
almost  fluorescent orange,
needless to say, outfitted 
with matching accessories;
a mobile phone, a swatch, 
obligatory sun glasses, etc.,
and one more damp cigarette
desperately sucked upon
from sheer necessity…

Being fashionable 
is such a sad thing
(when people 
start to resemble
what they chase…

Alas, in time, in truth, anon,
such souls will soon appear
more like the allotted places
where savored things 
find themselves discarded)….

6.	  In this lift many years ago we kissed, 
between floors, as lovers are want to do.
Now no longer is this building still here, 
knocked down and in its place a newer, 
flashier, glitzier palace in glass and chrome 
stands in its stead; ah, such is life….

7.     Why must smokers walk up wind,    
alight from trains lighting up, 
taking pleasure riding the escalators
in the slip stream of each other
as if one cigarette is not enough..?!

Dear Editor, 
     Would you please delete 
the above poem and substitute the following. 
       Many thanks, N.T.

Why must non-smokers walk upwind,
be fleet of foot to escape
fellow passengers lighting up,
need to race up escalators to elude
a thin, self-seeking slip-stream as if 
‘getting up one nose’ is not enough…!

Dear Editor, 
	     Can you also add the following 
verse to the above.
       Many thanks, N.T.

Alas where there’s smoke there’s fire,
where there’s folk, blokes who must light up,
as if a heavenly choir, entranced on incense,
and, at the same time, insulting their creator, 
who, should they exist, must be taking 
their time reading the fine print  
on those well-designed packets…!

Ah, well, perhaps true compassion 
is practised when it’s dispensed with,
overseen with a healthy dose of oversight
when discreetly titrated…?

8.	An old Chinese gentleman
with a bright rainbow umbrella...

I wonder if he knows what it all means..?

I watch him walking slowly 
along the busy street 
and, in time, realize that…
yes, he does…

But, as yet, his family 
doesn’t know
that he knows that….

9.	A small group of young guys
walking along the street…

Off to a dance party?
Off to a pub? 
Who knows..?

Sharing white tablets 
in the bright glare 
of the neon night…

One rectangular pill
falls to the ground –
a piece of chewing gum;
no more, nothing less…

How old fashioned 
can you get…?

10.	A middle aged guy
as rotund as Bodhidarma
is walking arm in arm 
with a young, feminine, 
Asian woman of dubious gender
with an equally dubious agenda…

They looked happy
in their incongruity,
laughing at laughter itself,
fitting like two odd pieces 
from the same jig-saw puzzle….

11.	The local tattooist
was closing his shop,
on a hot summer’s day,
and it was obvious that he was
an exponent of that art,
quickly running out
of space to advertise his wares;
finding, on the way past,
only a small space 
in the front window,
beside the door, 
for a few last token 
illustrations of his craft….

12.	As they say “It’s a dog’s life…”

Sniffing ten thousand lampposts,
chasing after every furry four legged creature,
and the odd two legged one…

On the streets and in the park no one lets on 
they are checking each other out,
taking a second look, making mental notes…

As they say “It’s a dog’s life…”

And that is the problem, we would like to know
just who ‘they’ might be to make such an observation..!

As they say “It’s a dog’s life….”

13.   Dry leaves, like mice, are
scurrying though the rubbish,
screeching as they go….

14.	All relationships in time
should be reflected upon, 
digested..?

A couple in a restaurant
are quietly arguing;
it’s near the end of a hot day,
perspiring with hair awash
they wait uncomfortably
for the meal they ordered,
bread not yet brought to the table…

Over the fish salad and French-fries
they continue to squabble
in a dignified English manner,
attacking the meal with a hunger
equal to the catalogue 
of their enumerated complaints.
At least they agree not to eat
the remaining sodden, 
oil-drenched chips floating 
in a small shrinking sea
of alfalfa bean sprouts
and other miscellaneous debris…

The shared dessert is 
silently consumed
with a new-found vigour 
having had time to recover
from the weary travails of the day,
the sweet confection,
a virtual tour de force, 
melting under the tongue, 
embracing a pleasure 
punctuated only by the emission 
of a few ah’s and ums…

For afters they have a coffee
with a selection of delectable
chocolates from Belgium 
imitating fruits and flowers,
re-starting a conversation
with plans for the evening
all delicately discussed 
in an atmosphere 
of mutual congratulation…

This is friendship - a repast 
that should be savored
before time swallows the chance 
to taste such a past-time…?

15.	Human time bombs
on a long, slow fuse,
ready to explode,
taking everyone with them: -
bloody smokers...!

Human ashtrays,
human trashcans…

These fools flirt with death
with black-stained hands 
smeared with a frothy blood;
idiotic semiotic islands,
coughing adver/tisements
repeated ad nauseam
spreading cultural cancer 
through the tissues 
of the psyche,
stubbing out each soul,
one by one, if not already beaten,
worn down, wasted
by some other social ill
just as deadly,
just as suicidal…!

So rare the natural death 
of the chronic smoker
that we should celebrate
their timely passing
in one long, last puff of smoke 
through tall, white chimneys 
with a callous, scabby bore
as dark as their own….

16.	The bald barber
is working in his busy salon –
what does he know about hair..?

A lot it seems,
catching up, by proxy….

17.	Into this room we have wandered,
through the same door, but not the same portal…

Such a room has a name but no walls,
with wide windows that look inward upon
a world of congregated souls…

In good faith or in bad faith we enter,
we set out to explore, probing the text,
self-questioning the need for that last question…

I think I know what brings you here, and, 
I know that you most likely think the same for me..?

But can thoughts and desires be so easily matched
and packaged like two packs of ornate cards 
in a perfect, parallel game of snap..?

A butcher sells meat for money,
and in the work he has done is happy…
before the plain mirror reflected in time
could virtual friendship be as mutual..?!

18.	Along a long, formal table of almost thirty diners
four thoughtful smokers inhabit the confines of one end
trying ever so hard not to feel over-looked, and neglected,
trying ever so hard to ignore their own ignorance,
lit up in conversation over burning issues not too polluted…!

19.	People like to know where they are going,
like to know where you might be headed,
seek a title that says it all, a sign-post to heaven;
third road on the left, if you don’t stop at the lights;
seek sense even in a poem streets ahead of all the rest,
caught speeding, without a license…?

20.	Today finished a great novel; read not written,
and feel I have met that author; somewhere in there,
somewhere between the lines, sighted in each chapter,
elusive, in virtual space betwixt the cover;
like footsteps on the sand even if washed away
you just know that someone recently passed you by, 
some person who was quite some person, is someone,
like fragrances from a neighbour’s garden at night,
smelt, unseen scents literally traced out upon the breeze, 
felt like the soft breath of whispered conversation
that says, “I am still here, I am instilled in air…”
too subtle to be caught in a web of words, no
instrument to show a silent ghost wandered by 
with their rustling servants of a thousand pages….

21.	It was a damp, dismal 
evening in Darlinghurst,
the ladies of the night
were lounging on a low sofa,
their shapely form silhouetted
through the open cottage doorway,
body language conveying 
a profound sense 
of ennui…

On the other hand
the tom cat on the window sill
was proudly purring
with his ruffled neck held high,
for today he is the center
of attention….

22.	The young lad asked me for a spare cigarette…

Do I look like a smoker, I thought to myself,
and since when does a smoker have a ‘spare’ cigarette..?

“No, I don’t smoke,” I said abruptly, as I looked at him,
wondering if that was what he was really wanting,
asking for; perhaps, as I was thinking to myself,
he just merely felt the need for a friend to chat to,
some company, as we both marched on down hill;
although, I am sure, his shorter legs would get him
to the railway station a lot faster than mine, alas….

23.	Autumn leaves -
little messages from the past…

Against the gray sky -
little bursts of light;
a kaleidoscope of colour…

Little messengers
proclaiming winter -
provoking brief moments 
saturated with
a joyful-sadness….

24.	Beneath the proud, bronze plaque
bolted into the weathered sandstone
a calligraphic squiggle signaled the tag 
of one more mindless graffiti attack…

In Constantinople, on high marble railings
around the imperial box in the Santa Sophia,
simple Norse runes can be found scratched,
treasured signs of a past long since re-written…

When will those cryptic messages meet 
with similar approval; perhaps, if better framed 
within a cartouche, but that too, I’m sad to say, 
would have flaked just as quickly….

25.	“Hallo, where are y’ livin’ these days?”

“In chippendale….”

“In good old Chippo, eh, I’m still in Darlo,
hated it when I was in the Cross, not goin’ back there…”

“What are you doin’ this arvo…?

“More uni I’m ‘fraid, lectures and swat,
have to put my head down, no togs for me,
then it’s off to see the reli’s;
as busy as a bee on e (/ecstacy)…”

I pity the migrant who has to learn 
how to translate English into Strine,
and vice versa, discover how to contract, 
and when to re-coin an apposite australianism…

Just listen, just listen, it’s a feminine tongue,
full of diminutives, affection and fun,
carefree like the breeze running out of breath,
running out of things to say, skirting death…?

26.   Western butterfly –
so fragile and fleeting…

Eastern butterfly –
a symbol of immortality…

But you look again
and the enduring moment 
has flown away….

27.   We all live on a slippery slope,
like walking on thin ice,
that sweet slice of life 
one bite away from disaster:-
shifting house, without a flat;
sickness, and loss of health;
fell under a passing bus;
missed the last step
going downstairs,
and still going downhill;
no money till the next pay,
and that day - date unknown;
unexpected loss of job, 
have y’ been made redundant,
one more time, 
y’ already know
what it feels like,
fired by the boss,
struck off some roll
or weighty register,
even excommunicated,
sent to Coventry, or worse,
filmed by television
and already pre-censured
for some social crime or other,
committed or not committed,
it can only get worse..?

You pinch y’ self - its all a dream…

Yet, life’s like that:-
the missed opportunity;
failure in that last exam; 
ultimate expulsion,
deleted from the telephone book;
a final dribble of mail
left unread, thrown away;
thankfully, a few last bills
you didn’t have to pay for
up front..?

28.   ‘Tis true rough rock is the more beautiful 
than any fancy, freshly inspired sculpture,
yet, if the sculpture be captured in stone, 
surely, that proud, pedestalled piece must be 
even more magnificent than just nature’s 
mere handy-work, just as the half-shattered 
scratchings and scrapings of a child’s castle 
moulded in sand facing a watery fate 
must be better than any glinting quartz grain -
rainbow-hued, multi-faceted, crystal…
ourselves, our handiwork, this creation
washed away like an ice-cream in a cone
about to be lapped in the licking tide;
…made with sweat, erased without regret...?

29.   This fashionable young artist
walking about the town,
is making a statement in personal style -
an heroic masterpiece,
quite romantic in presentation,
almost classical in quotation,
come to think of it I can see
a grand form quite integrated
and, yet, synthetic, eclectic, 
brilliantly minimal,
definitely post-modern
with all the labels on the outside;
only missing a tag for price
which you can request
from the up-market, artful gallery 
promoting his designer wares…

30.	On the television
it was so sad to see
those lost souls sobbing,
‘bombed’ out of their homes,
having to flee 
without money,
without passports,
without food;
all one million
or more of them…

And I thought
the nomadic way of life
was fast disappearing…

Then I re-saw around me
the homeless in this city,
huddled masses
with their blankets,
on the church lawn
looking like rows of corpses,
in the moonlight lit up
like marble effigies
awaiting the day of judgment…

Then, whilst I was watching 
a movie on the television;
set in winter,
it rained heavily
on the tin roof of this terrace
and those ghostly figures,
I am sure, as if on cue,
arose to seek shelter
in the cavernous doorway 
of the church hall, 
looking like figures 
from Hades about to cross 
the river-road of the Styx,
waiting for Charon, or,
when the moon, or sun, 
shines down once more 
upon their newly 
‘chosen’ home….

31.	A mixed up native guy
is asleep slumped out
on the pavement,
his rumpled tee-shirt revealing,
tucked into his trousers,
a rolled up copy of
“Lesbians on the Loose”….

32.	Our intelligent town fathers,
in having street furniture re-designed,
forgot to replace the rubbish bins
in front of the main railway station;
the sole water fountain over-flowing
with a stream of debris….

But, then, such attentive planning
can also be seen in ‘our’ new bus shelters:
trendy post-modern erections
with wind-foil uplifted fronts
that just invite the entry
of the roaring rain, miserable amenities
whose reason for existence
is as an excuse for more advertise/ment
upon the street, billboards
that successfully block the view
of the oncoming buses…

I pity the poor bus drivers as they pass
these blinds for passengers;
either overshooting their bus-stops 
or dawdling past in the hope of bagging 
a few unseen customers,
or, ignoring them altogether
in a similar vein as seems to be professed
by most post-structuralist architects….

Give the public what they need, 
what they want, then do that in style;
don’t sketch people in at the last moment,
putting them into some mocking model drawn 
with perspective, planting them 
like ubiquitous vegetation uniformly landscaped 
in just one shade of strident green…

But, there is some hope, these devices 
being built upon the street are vandal proof
being designed, without doubt, 
by the same culprits themselves..! 

Unlike the new parking meters 
which give the ferals a kick in return 
when they milk them like cash-cows…!

33.	Can the same old dish be re-invented?

The oriental noodle shop 
was having a meal delivered 
from the Italian pasta shop next door…

Not a good sign, I thought…

“Oh it’s alright,” I was told 
by the proprietor of the pasta shop,
“we eat their food and they eat ours…”

Well, the plot thickens, indeed…

Just what would the public think
if they were told that the chefs
no longer eat their own food..?

Perhaps variety is indeed the spice of life…?

Perhaps East and West can meet
and here entertain each other,
tempting the palate with plates
of exotic temptations that, in truth,
when all is said and done,
are not that very different after all…!

34.	Just who today writes poetry..?

Farting school children, 
academics on the run,
the butcher in her shop, 
the policeman with his gun,
the happy hippie drinking gin,
the native painter with his brush,
the socialite with too much money,
the bank manager on the bus,
the passionate mum pushing her pram,
the sweet guy with the earring
writing a new love letter each night;
inserted with sonnets that rhyme…

Today, just who doesn’t write poetry, 
I sigh, with a deep breath, alas;
and just who has the time to read
this mountain of artful crafting, I ask...?

Oh, hopefully, those searching souls 
that learn to recite each other;
discovering those songs that float past 
like ‘an effortless feather ….’

35.	Depressing Autumn:
the eucalypts lost their leaves,
branches snapped by hail….

36.   City workers were rushing home.
It was a dark and wintry night
and the streets were filled with noise…

A busker was resting his instrument…

For encouragement I rewarded him
with a small gold coin....

37.   Don’t accuse an aboriginal 
of writing fiction...

Their stories are rooted in reality,
coincident with the landscape,
an example of a ‘postmodern’ faction 
with a resolving tension,
in a veritable variety of  versions...

White-washed in a colorful mud,
daubed with feathers, characters
leading parallel lives between tribes,
dancing in different stories,
sharing the same mythic heroes 
within the dreaming of the same tribe;
given the same difference in meaning
on each retelling...

Depicted in pictures in paintings 
now hanging on walls
with evocative titles 
for a familiar frame...

May be one day those myths too
could become ours to share
when we take the bus to ‘Ayers Rock,’
sleep in a totem shaped hotel
beside a mysterious waterhole,
stare lovingly at the desert sands
with a knowing smile..?

May be on that day this land will then become
our land, our land....

38.   Two railway workmen on the platform
have just positioned themselves beside 
the glassed in steps to view 
the disembarking passengers
as they flee on route to work;
a brand new secretary in a short black skirt,
without the advantage of power dressing,
brings a broad, knowing, nodding smile 
to their dark, oil-besmeared faces...

Old enough to be village people,
wearing their hard yellow hats,
we see all innocence in their unplanned
coincidence beside these steps betrayed.

But what if one or both also took a delight
in those school boys there dressed as cadets,
all spic and span in short tight khaki pants 
in sizes twice outgrown as if on some gay parade,
could that be so easily worn upon the sleeve..?

If all our thoughts were given such visible expression
would the universe be a kinder place to know,
or, is it best our deepest desires are left unsaid
lest living in nakedness like animals 
we should all become like beasts..?

Still, alas, the way the world appears to be 
all wrapped up and dispatched accordingly
does not always match the contours 
of the landscape undulating below...

The beating heart is beaten into shape,
singing songs already written by others,
voices in unison in a parallel pitch
kept straight like these railway tracks...?

39.   He’s off his face 
on alcohol and ecstasy,
once a quiet neighbour
now like a dog’s 
breakfast on heat,
an instant party,
just don’t forget to add 
a few drops of water
when coming to the boil....

40.	He, the author, stood 
in the doorway
in subtle shades of gray.
The walls were off-white,
the curtains fawn
with a minimal pattern,
the widows covered
in a simple plastic lace,
standing alone in one corner
an oriental sculpture looked lost,
beside black leather furniture
a glass topped coffee table
slinked away almost unseen,
but, his lips were a soft red
and his eyes a brilliant blue
betraying his postmodernism;
waiting for a breaking crack 
in the naked dawn
to let the living colour spin
a novel character
in a brave new chapter
on blank sheets
not yet drawn upon…?

41.	He used to let me play
with the soft whiteness of his whiskers,
he used to let me rub
his furry chest with a smile,
and a backrub never went amiss,
so erotic, so faithful 
my neighbour’s cat
before they moved away….

42.   The chef said to me
it takes time to serve a dish,
plenty of preparation,
a few drops of sweat,
a need to get the best ingredients
from Nature’s kitchen,
attention to detail,
baking a few ideas
in a master-plan,
the right time in the oven
thoughtfully reflected upon,
served poetically upon the plate,
the right proportion of spice
and additional garnishes
that don’t hide the substance
of your style, some time
to savour and then digest
this menu of crisp letters
that plays upon the palate
as an entree to the mind
set forth for another’s tasting,
hopefully, with some relish,
and a desire to sample again
some more of the perfected handiwork 
from that inspired person….

43.	Hiccuped all day,
dry-retched and vomited,
felt like a woman about to give birth
whose waters had just broken….

What I had was a dose of gastric flu
caught in life’s unlucky lottery,
would that our breeding
might not be so ill-conceived..?

And who says our lives
are grandly controlled by planets
passing and pulsing
between the winking stars..?

When it’s the smallest things
that perturb the course
of our daily lives, from cosmic dust
to the oblivion of ashes, once again…?		(With help from my friends David and Marc)

44.	The last time I saw you
was at McDonalds 
walking past, myself,
just too far away
to catch up with you…

The reality of a friend
no longer with you,
a soul with whom 
one has lost contact…

Still out there, 
one suspects, 
imprinting vibrations 
upon the ether, 
hopefully…?

45.	The neo-Baroque front
of the church soared high
above the street…

But it was just a façade,
the roof reaching the same level
as the houses beside it….

46.	I noticed others 
noticing you upon the street,
with your bulbous, bubble-butt,
and your trunk-like shorts 
encasing a chunky cock,
you, with a soccer waist 
and a set of rugby legs,
as high as a basket baller,
playing hard ball by not letting on,
watched by women, and men,
and nervous boys; all with mouths
restrained from falling open…

How could this lord alone
take pleasure in this creation…?

47.	Sifting fakes and forgeries
from the reality of the real thing…

This thing is Ching,
that thing is Ming,
and this is meant to be Sung
and ‘ill go for a ‘song’
because it is just wrong,
just wrong…

But don’t look too long
and hard over your friends,
these fine pieces of china here,
for everything is at rock bottom
a facsimile of what went before
with an inevitable variation…!

48.	Today, at the local
community opportunity shop,
I bought a one hundred dollar tie 
for a dollar, refusing to pay two.
Lady, they sold them last week for one, 
does your ego or my ego 
suffer that much inflation…?

Luckily for me we ended up agreeing 
to disagree in all but price, and the tie –
a simulated patchwork quilt,
demonstrating a hundred 
different types of material
as if stitched together….

49.	Do I need these silver soup spoons
found in a skip with a sign,
“please take, a deceased estate…”

As if in a seventh heaven;
I feel, when using them, 
I must be in Paddington….

50.    Lies, lies and damn’d lies…
and not a spec of absolute truth…

To speak truthfully you must be dishonest…

And this is the lie of the land,
that, in the filter of experience,
nothing survives,
nothing  remains..!?

At first I was frightened,
terrified, then realizing
the consequences of this position
found, felt such fine relief,
in ecstasy said,
“let’s drink to that,
everything is the same…”

True global democracy,
cosmic equivalence,
a picture in transformation,
perfectly liberated 
in profound emptiness,
no survival, 
no remains…!