Two Thousand Eight -31/12/2008

.

This year,
If,
I could almost count,
Intimate encounters had,
On one hand,
That weren't with that hand,
On the other hand,
I can count this year itself,
As the best one,
I've ever had.

This year gone,
If,
It saw stock markets fall,
My dollar decreases,
In the crisies',
Then at least,
As a stock, my own life's-value,
Split and sky-rocketed ten fold,
Through its experiences,
Felt,
Not that I would trade it,
For anything else.

This year,
Found my voice,
Yelling hoarse,
As I learned the lyrics of alone,
Off by heart,
Singing all the words in the rain,
Washed me clean across,
Forty-three cities' streets,
And two overnight sleeper trains.

That weather now on my face,
One year sunrises,
Five continents later,
They used to say I looked young for my age,
This year,
No one says that anymore.

They say,
In so many words,
I'm heir apparent,
To the outrageously fortunate,
To a life now taken hold,
A year later not feeling so old,
As I used to.

One year,
Once around the sun on this planet we go,
And I've made friends all over it,
From all over it.

Life, time,
You can feel pieces of them both,
Twinned in every breath you take,
Inhale it all from the air through nostrils,
And out again from your mouth,
You can renew,
These gratitudes,
There in every breath,
Or take them as simple platitudes,
Down to your death.

I'm thankful,
For it all,
End of year you old acquaintances,
Are not forgotten,
You friends I've never met, yet,
I'm writing a general 'thank you',
To this life,
That is only and that is the least,
I can do.

I, we, Us,
Got a lot to celebrate,
From this year passing,
Two thousand and eight,

It's been the greatest, funnest, crasiest, bestest year I've had, to date.




__________________________________________________




In 2008, I've had a year that can barely, scarcely, poorly be contained within that four letter word. So, wherever, whoever and however you are, in whatever circumstance you find yourself in today, in this life, you have my best wishes, and hopes. May you find whatever it is that make you smile. Twice over.






-Peace

Not With You At You -29/12/2008

.

Laugh,
Laugh yourself in half,
Laugh like a life raft,
At long last,
Or a parachute catching your up-draught.

Laugh like there's enough left in the cup,
Then laugh yourself the right side up,
Laugh like it’s all you know how to do,
Like that laughter can save you,
Giggles going to see-you-through.

Laugh like you’re the left-over,
Wedding feasts from funeral meats,
Laugh like the unconscionable king,
Or the lunatic on the grass,
Laugh,
And chuckle like slips over a sly word,
Laugh like the black cloud,
Lines lining the silver tongue,
Licking laughs off your cheeks,
With whipped cream,
In wet dreams,
Down streams that break at the seams.

Laugh like error-mongers,
Sucking vampires of their follies,
Laugh like the drunken monkeys,
Riding schooners,
High speed into brick walls,
Then arguing with the conductor,
For more change,
Back,
Exact change,
To the deranged.

Laugh.
Your wicked witchcraft.

Laugh,
Or I’ll hurt you.
And laugh ‘til it hurts you.

Laugh like it’s gonna flesh you out,
Dig you in,
Fill you up,
Taking hand-biting feeds,
On your chin,
Hold your humour within,
My bad taste,
Bitters.

Laugh.
I said laugh, fucker,
Laugh!

________________________________


-Peace

The Music, Man... -15/12/2008

.

The screen, is cracked,
Or shattered, to be exact,

You better, just relax,
Stat,
Just cool out, and deal with that,


(...)


. . . AH CRAP!


______________________________________

A shorty today, but maybe a little more fun that last round? Meant to have something a little meatier ready, but we're outta time, rhymes for these lines... etcetera, and I'm running late, late for a very important... prior engagement.



-Peace



.

In Whore Eyes -09/12/2008

.

“Asking all these questions ain't highly recommended,
They’ll eventually get answered if you put time into friendship,
That is if what you’re doing is helping and it’s not like you know until you, uh…

…reach the ending”


-Sage Francis, Agony in Her Body






You want those eyes to adore you,
Those eyes… do not adore you.
Those eyes,
Look like vacancies,
Light-up signs at a hotel,
On the road,
Those eyes aren’t a home,
Nor a real shelter,
From the storm you're stuck in,
They're just a sign,
Saying you can stay,
Overnight,
If you must.

Nothing looking back at you,
Not eyes not-looking back,
No ~ nothing looking back,
At you.

No matter,
How you feel that body move,
Under you, in front of, on top of,
Feel the twitches and see spasms,
You’re sure this is all real,
Like the mattress beneath you both,
Feels thin and possibly hiding stains,
It’s a bit like her, liking you,
In this dim light you’re in.

Looking back,
Nothing trying to find you,
Coming for you as you’re diving in,
It will find you through flinches in a tangled blanket,
A mangled top,
Twisted bra on the floor,
Two matching shoes at opposite ends of the room.

You’re unseen and drowning in her out-of-focus.
You’re the cause of all this friction,
The lengths you go to in her,
Into her nothing, you see,
Eyes that won’t look to hold you,
Eyes you’ll plead to hold you,
Begging as physical exertion,
Each thrust says,
Please her, please me,
Please,
Show me,
Something there,
Please,
Can’t these eyes grab onto you?
Pretend for a bit like you’re something,
Make you believe you could be,
Allowed somewhere inside her head,
Please?

You can access one of her voids,
In exchange for another.
The body answers,
Pleads with her too in a chorus with yourself,
But the windows of that soul,
Are shut,
You’re thumping knocks unanswered,
Eyes not heeding, needing or holding promises,
Eyes not lust more fear, at her fearlessness,
Not what happens when you come out,
Not exactly regret,
But simply embodying you,
As… the time-being.

You are her fatalism,
As a vessel,
Leveled against the dregs,
Of four beer bottles,
That have all accidentally fallen off the walls,
That she keeps up,
To keep men like you, out.

While your walls are all down,
To stop you together needing,
What you’re wanting from her.

A fable explaining,
What you can, and cannot have,
That girl, woman,
Who sleeps in this room,
Beautiful, sharp,
Utterly alive,
Met earlier that evening,
Nope, not allowed to have her,
In the blank stare back,
That much is clear.
You can have her like a slut,
Who has alcohol,
Who has a roommate out,
Who has nothing better to do,
Than make a mistake,
Out of you.

Those eyes speak of transaction,
Not seduction,
Fucking eyes that she will not give you,
For her all her sounds,
Her gripping on the head board,
Facial twitches,
Grimaces, you know these movements well,
But the eyes worked against completing her face,
Eyes that won’t allow the rest of her to see you.

Eyes that are looking at you,
Like a ghost story,
That scares her.

Tinting her twitches bitter,
The eyes will keep just the one thing else,
From everything she’s let you have,
Tonight.
That long hair, ear lobes,
Hips down to labial folds,
Her legs that should be all-yours.
The eyes steal everything back,
What you’re taking from the break in,
They’re not going to give in.
Will not let you have,
A moment with her.

Those two dark orbs.
You swear,
See right through the back of you.

Her daytime eyes are not yours to have,
You cannot keep,
You cannot hold,
You cannot touch,
Thief, cheat and hollow man.
Look at your hard earned prize,
Looking back.

In all this,
You’re getting nothing,
From a real her,
Just damned eyes that’ll leave you,
Both later to despise yourselves,
Because you’ve been seen,
As you might look in the eyes of a whore,

Now she really wasn’t this,
But this is really what her eyes gave you,


And you didn’t particularly like what you saw.





____________________________________________


Now, just remember the opening to the accompanying quote, before you comment. I've blogged a lot lately, consciously, becauase tomorrow I'm off the beaten track again for a while. So until next time-



-Peace


.

The Last Word -13/11/2008

.

Assailed,
I banner for cowards,
Enlist with the liars,
The black humoured,
With theives for the calvary,
There are wars,
Fought through ear drums,
Decided in ball points,
There are enemies,
At the short end of the pen I hold,
There are hostilities,
Delcared in these keystrokes.

There are targets,
Our objective,
To raze a subjective,
To the ground,
The Mongols reach Baghdad,
These are the words,
Wanting to be destroyed by other words,
A warzone marked on a map,
Campaign unfolding across prose pages,
With my own hand-writing,
For whatever this is that,
And which is what,
Struggles against it's shape,
It strategy,
Refuses attempts at being described.

Evading the pitch battles,
In my ink-by-the-barrel,
Anger the likes of Ahab's worst rages,
Against the whale,
A need for furrowed brows,
For set jaws and fast walks,
To define myself -what is not,
To define myself defiant,
To re-define the self,
Of the group,
Of itself.
Of my shape,
The space I inhabit.
And all its possibilities in deadlock.

The laughter,
Comes sharp daggered smiles,
And blunt speach,
I throw words at this like,
Angry student pelt police riot shields,
Funny,
I fuel words catching on fire with words,
Fighting,
I'm all smoke-and-mirrors now,

The self-conscious threatens,
The interests of a truer self.
Throwing myself into the work and throwing that all,
Over the edge,
Burn the bridges back,
Bets are off,
Burnt hedges and now fire-the-breaks,
Catapult phrases after another,
Each going over my walls,
Projections trying to hit something,
Smash something,
Hurt something,
Wreck something,
Get at something inside,
That needs destroying.

Some storm,
Some waves and the rumble,
Walls,
Surrender and disarmnements,
That aren't coming,
With condition or negotiation.

Destroy myself -in so many, many words,
Simply because no other could,
Perservere,
Knowing not what you try preserving,
As empty stomachs were drained to fuel,
This war machine.

The stomach for it,
The very reason I'm compelled to attack it,
Make a new self,
Build to kill an old one,
Tear that bloody thing down too,
Keep tearing,
Till I can't tell you to stop,
The russian doll in razors edges,
Man.

Truth under seige,
Trojan poets
Carthage comprehension,
A Leningrad of lies,
All of them, in me, comprised,
Beseiging,
Laying down trenches around,
My inner-court walls.

Hammer away,
Targets for the dents in that thing,
The seams,
The seemings,
Your weapons are my words,
Yielded to malice,
Berzerker,
The violence vividly describing,
A soul bought in the binges,
Verbose bargaining,
Going once... and sold.

Pay for the war efforts.
Fight to the lasting.
Me against me.
No alliances sought with you.
Bordering on disputes,
Outside territory stays nuetral.

While inside, an invasion force launches
No terms for surrender offered,
None accepted,
It's myself against me.


Fighting, to see who gets the last word.



__________________________________________________




-Peace (...in our time)

Darth Vader Died, My Dad. -07/12/2008

.


My Dad probably couldn’t tell a poem,
From a recipe for lentil soup,
And has exceedingly little use for either,
That’s two differences between us.

In fact for the longest time,
All we had in common,
Was a shared fondness for Star Trek,
And a loathing, for one another.

Back then,
Our interactions came and were formed,
When the school principal contacted him,
Your son is in detention,
Your son is out of control,
Your son is about to get kicked out of this school,
Again.

Those phone calls to my father,
My biggest fear,
That’s how I grew up,
My worst enemy,
Just out to punish me,
Or otherwise a father, whose never there.

He got mad at my behavior,
While I compared him to Darth Vader,
‘Cause how could he be my father,
I liked to liken my Dad to that black evil monster,
‘Cause I didn’t feel like his son.

He used confiscate my possessions in punishment,
Wake up to find things missing out of my room,
He’s already gone to work,
And if only he had been there,
I could have shown him,
How much I hated him,
Never gonna forgive him,
Never ever.

When I was sixteen,
I scratched off his face,
From my infant photograph with him,
Had no right to hold who that baby became,
Doesn’t know who I am,
Spend time with me and doesn’t try.

Didn’t ever want to talk to him again,
And didn’t sometimes for days,
For weeks that would have been for-ever, if I could help it.
Because I was living under his roof,
In His house, His rooms,
His Television,
His unreasoning,
His bullshit, his face,
I just wanted to punch it in,
But couldn’t
… because he was much bigger than me.

My adolescent time passed, our tension eased,

With the end to my grueling high-schooling,
Without principals calling,
We have a kind of agreement in principal,
Don’t bother me,
And I won’t be bothered by you.
We might watch together some Star Trek,
And I began working on building up a HECS debt.

For years, it was left at that,
When I saw in another photograph,
The same face that had I scratched away from me as a baby,
Became…my own face.
Different hair colour,
Smaller stature, sure,
But there he was, his features all over my face,
And more.

Started from that one photograph I started to find,
All his strengths and frailties were similar to mine,
When my father laughs,
He laughs from the belly,
Just like me,
But it’s not a thing he confiscated for penance,
Just a shared sense,
Of black humour,
A world that all too often needs laughing at,
Whether you swing from the right or left.

When I left the country.
In affection He called me,
His Frankenstein’s monster,
Let loose in the world,
This is how I see myself too.

I’m assembled from recognized,
Components of him,
None of them now grave or hateful.
I became the impudent boy that he is,
My Dad mellows, more youthful with age,
As I ratchet up grim rollercoasters of rage.
A strange trade.

Those long years in between his scratched-off face,
And finding my own place in life,
Saw me now re-watching Return of the Jedi,
With a closer, more analytical eye,
In that movie Darth Vader, the evil monster died,
Once begotten, the dark father shunned for years
But unmasked and demystified by time,
Redeemed and seen reborn in the arms of his son,
It’s geeky, it’s a monstrous conceit,
But I saw the force of good in him,
Through his similarities to me.

We took years learning not to fear one another,
This brings us to this summer,
I will be away for his birthday,
And Christmas day,
Where usually every year,
My Dad and I delve into every topic,
That polite company prefers not to discuss,
(Please boys?)
My poor sisters and mother,
The others have to duck for cover,
Pleading with us for no more,
Of these rounds we’re firing,
Like we proxy for Andrew Bolt and Michael Moore.

Across the table and platters,
The women of the family will never understand,
These globally warmed heated discussions,
They can’t see the animation twinned in our faces,
Thriving in impersonal mercurials,
We both convinced we have the monopoly of truth,
Then, call a truce,
Agreeing to disagree,
Both in glee having dueled with a worthy adversary,
A way we’ve found to relate,
Our unique way to communicate.

We know us both,
An opinion not worth itself,
Lest you can beat someone else over the head with it,
Not live at let live,
We both feel alive when we striven,
A life not to suffer fools,
Who are foolish in their foolishness,
And if they could only see how foolish they are,
But they just don’t get it… the fools.

He still only knows as much about me as Mum tells him,
We still don’t talk much,
We can drive somewhere together,
Two hours in the car yet exchange all of ten words.
The sum, of differences,
Between lazily watching slow films in fast forward,
And a guy, who can’t service a bike of his won accord.

I understand those vast spaces between our words,
Those years lost opposing worlds,
The gaps of a generation generated between,
The sixties and the nineties,
Not cats for cradles,
Just discs in the DVD player,
As we sat watching Star Trek together.

We really don’t to say much wih words,
In order to understand each other,
Because every time we meet now,
I understand his personal quirks somehow,
Things that became the more important parts of me.
Not just who I turned to for help keeping my car on the road,
Or taking the brunt of the financial load,
Lending me a few grand,
To extended my travel plans.

More than simply this,
He is the very source of that strength in my hands,
Holding the driver’s wheel and never yet causing an accident,
He has shared a keen mind with me,
Our knack for insights,
Plainly missed by lesser minds,

He enjoys his books and his bikes,
A quiet drink,
Some time alone to think.

It’s what makes my dad, my Dad.
All the same things that make me, Me.
An apple, not falling far from his tree.

I love him.

Simply stated.
Something,
I’m not going to leave un-articulated,
So like David said to Captain Kirk at the end of Star Trek 2,
There something I’ve wanted to say to you,

Today the time has come,
To say, Dad,


“I’m proud… very proud, to be your son.”



_________________________________________________________


Well, couldn't think of what to get my Dad for his birthday this year, so I wrote him this, and emailed it to him earlier today. God knows what he'll make of it. I found it surprisingly and incredibly difficult working this subject matter into a piece of reasonable length, clarity, accessibility or artistic merit, but... considering the absolute mess it was as late as this morning, I'm reasonably happy with it, although another rewrite and edit down to something more athletic will happen at some point. For now, I'm just glad to have delivered on time.



-Peace


.

The Lazy Traveler -06/11/2008

.
"Here's to the death of the lazy traveler!"
-Shannon Ford


I saw the death of a lazy traveler,
Falling off a bus roof-top,
Into the frays of Nepalese hotel touts,
He scattered them like disturbed dust,
Blown off the maps,
He landed in fields of mustard yellow flowers,
Thudded on the dirt,
A sound made like how rhinoceros footfalls should thump.

…But don’t.

We buried the lazy traveler right there,
Behind the Banana plants and jungle vines,
Dressed in his dark sunglasses,
Looming,
Inside a free Tibet t-shirt,
Two sizes too big for an Israeli kid to wear,
His was the air conditioned,
Recommended set breakfast,
Seat feet rest, and all the rest.

The Lazy traveler fell to his death,
No handle on it,
And couldn’t hang on,
He’d asked for sunscreen on top of this bus,
On top of the world,
As it drove by kilometers of trees,
Painted chalk grey,
The sun was not seen protection enough,
The sun has no wrinkles to laugh from,
And no pity for pink skin.

The lazy traveler died bargaining for his life,
The journey of that lifetime,
Not sold packaged by an agent,
Couldn’t buy his way out of this one,
Not marked up or watered down,
Sanitized for the sane of mind,
Never-minding the tree branches,
He would never need to duck under,
As the bus lumbered on,
Like a train to Jordan.

His final resting place,
Resting between the getting there and away sections,
The easy to follow directions,
Far from beeps of trundling jeeps,
On dusty roads not described,
In resort brochure picture placards,
Far from the hotel lobbies,
Of the hot water showered,
Nails, hair, scrubbed,
Conditioned, condition.

The lazy traveler not a local language speaker,
Attempts dying down his throat,
He chokes on his own words,
Not knowing anyone else’,
On the way up.
On his way down.

Lazy traveler died,
Catching the dis-ease,
Of a comfort zoned out of bounds,
The risks,
Sweat heavy strapped to his back,
Sideways for pear-shaped for god sakes,
Not traded for anything else,
That might kill him,
Slowly, un-really.

Instead dying amongst the unruly,
Reborn,
An observer,
Roof surfing,
Forgoing those forgone conclusions,
And testing assumptions,
In limits not recognized,
Nor observed.

The observer,
The dead lazy traveler’s inheritance,
Granted,
To gratify,
For the conceited,
What he needed,
To keep going,
All the while knowing,
That each step is merely the first,
In unending sequences of what comes next,
Life in the faster lanes driver's seat,
The sustained appetite for all you can eat,
Get it while you can,
Got a life stripped down,
The lazy traveler died a quick death,
Buried in a backpack,
Among friends,
As we become, again,
Aware,


That you only need to dig a little down, to find so much more out there.



___________________________________________________



I just wrote this 'live' -sitting here wading through a pile of emails that I haven't checked in nearly a week.

Back to India soon. Feeling ready for it, last few days have been incredible.



-Peace

.

Ninety Two Percent -1/12/2008

.

The ninety-two percent at sunset.

Tourism charter,
Down by the river,
Warmth still trapped,
Behind camera lenses,
In twenty one languages,
Admired in deck-chair phrases.

Sun,
Our new alchemist,
For clouds gone gold,
Trees crowd the scene from us,
Surrounding the view,
Tigers over there,
Same way that I'm really naked,
Under the all these clothes,
Somewhere,
Under a clear sky,
Vast, sans nimbus, cumulus',
Just a few stretch-markings,
White on blue, all turning pink.

I flutter my thoughts,
As birds mumble back across the sky,
As it understates the moon,
Hung there at the wrong angle,
The crickets still applaud anyway,
At the imperfections,
That I crowd here with

Could gaze away,
Ninety-two percent of them,
Away from this,
Away from me,
Away with me.

Visitor,
Expanding to fill the sky,
Himself,
Set the sun,
Everything in its place,
Everything that gathers a crowd,
All of it,
Fashionably late reflections,
Inside blinking slithered light on waters,

The sun ushered down now,
Behind receptive trees,
Some covenant to keep,
The jungles secrets,
Safe.

Across the river,
Keep them safe,


From the ninety two percent of me.



______________________________________________


Written at Sauraha, right on the edge of Chitwan National Park, Nepal. My first entry for notebook number six... and here we go again.



-Peace

Julie -22/11/2008

.


What woke me I’ll never know,
Felt the slightest vibration left in the air,
From a still echoing chime of midnight.
In a room full of strangers.

At heights above that of most mountains,
On a night colder than zero,
Up against corrugated tin walls,
On a mattress thinner than a thumb,
And as consistent as gravel.
At some point I had fallen asleep.

Then I felt it,
Terrified,
This slight constriction around the knee,
Then I heard it,
The faint rumble rousing me awake,
Sound barely a sound it so low.
Then I saw it,
Two slanted eyes squinted shut,
Curving spine,
Ears pointing up like pyramids,
Rounded little digits,
Escaping from under a stretched out chin.


…Hello cat.


Reached out to stroke her,
Gently not wanting to disturb,
Whatever feline dreams she may now be having.

The feel of cat fur,
Felt like home,
Long since left behind,
Purring coil of rumbles,
Breathing the night along,
Keeping it warm.


No wonder I was sleeping so soundly.



___________________________________________


-Peace

Taking -23/11/2008

.

"He thought -while his hand moved rapidly- what a power there was in words; later, for those who heard them, but first for the one who found them; a healing power, a solution, like the breaking of a barrier. He thought, perhaps, the basic secret the scientists have never discovered, the first fount of life, is that which happens when a thought takes shape in words."

.

-Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead.

TAKING -23/11/2008

The End.

Drinking from the fountainhead,
Through a funnel,
A well going dark and deep,
Found and dove into it.

Excavating eyes drill through the sediment,
The wanting,
The wanderings,
The boy who wants to steal words,

Back,
Heart, back.

Needs I don’t want,
Wanting for what I don’t need.
Terrible in its aspects,
Treacherous in its aims.

There is an escape velocity,
In a breathing exercise,
When the self is inhaled,
Then expelled over,
And over.

Until it’s over,
These impressions… are mine.
These words are mine.
This page.
This moment.
This man.

It’s all mine.
Whether or not it belongs at all,
It all belongs to me.

It cannot be taken,
Nor could I give it away.
Only take to,
Summoning the shoves,
To give to its own life.

Breathe.
This breath in all directions,
This breath is my sole directive,
Needing only in its execution,
The next moment to pass.
Counting up, down,

On nothing.

Breaking admiration,
By its back,
Love is that funnel,
My love, is my life,
My object is me.
Apologist for nothing,
Forever vulnerable,
Always indestructible,
Indivisible.

I put this forth,
As creations common denominator,
Lower than all else cancelled out,

The simplest number one.

Something found and won,
In a race to lose all else late,
To fall harder,
Impact more brutally,
and most honestly.

I’m writing this,
For me,
To me,
Not attempt neither finding,
Nor losing,
My-self.

But simply to acknowledge and honor,
Itself.

___________________________________________________

Recipe:
Ayn Rand's "The Fountainhead", the Himalayas, Solo trekking, Pre-disposition to self obsession, atheism, some perverted idea from Buddhism, and lack (nay, veritable drought) of intelligent conversation for the preceding few days or so... and YOU, gentle reader can be become and Objectivist too. And yes indeed, the uh.. "rapid hand movement" I retained for the opening quote can be thrown right back at me. ;-)

Shrug.

-Peace

Reloaded -07/11/2008

What I can’t walk away from,
Well,
Limping my way from the table,
That trekking handbook sitting there,
Like a wheelchair to be climbed out of again.

So I’m doing it again.

Maintaining,
You’ll have to drag me out of these mountains,
On a broken knee-joint,
On promises,
Or knee-jerks reactions,
To slip out,
The door without leaving a note,
Of concern,
Regret or common sensing,
That back home,
His conscience can rest,
In semi-retirement.

That the man’s gotta do,
What a man’s gotta do,
Damned fool idealistic crusade,
Proving something,
To an inductively falsified audience,

Undulating to the sound,
Of the death dance,
Too Human,
All too easy,
Pieces of the cake to eat too.
And damn you.

I know, I know,
You won’t try and stop me,
Not again,
You know better,
And knowing that I don’t,
I know,
I can hear you,
In your stubborn not saying,
Of stupid things like:
Stay safe.

Try another tact,
Like- I dunno mate,
Just… bring that hat back to us,
If nothing else,

Just keep that flat-capped cangoe safe.


_____________________________________________


http://img128.imageshack.us/my.php?image=imgl3599097hs7.jpg



-Peace

Midnight -17/11/2008

Scuttle away,
Door left ajar,
Voices trail off,
Down the outside staircase.

A second thought,
Response,
This one better not to fight,
Then round off down,
To a single number.

Late,
But not too late,
A carriage window,
Watching out,
For what those moments seeded,
Now wasting away.

Hurrying to the abort,
Early warning,
Secret signal,
Hands aligning,
The heart changes,
Fast.

Now.
Before you are seen,
Now,
Before your absence felt,
From back behind you,
Now,
Before excuses expand backwards.
Now,
Down this dark road again,
Now,
Safely away,
Into the blackened beckoning,
Of early midnights.
Hurry.

And now,
She is free,
Once more,
From their glances,
That reckoning,
An ultimatum unstated,
Left lodged between,
His eyes and her better judgement,
Left up there,
Wedged in place,
Hanging over her escape.

She makes it away,
In silence only excepting her own breath,
And carriage wheels rolling.

Heart beat resettling,
Then a slight bump in the road,
Rocks a break… in her dejavu

And quickly she raises her legs,
Checking to see,
With relief,
Still both glass slippers on her feet.

She is free,
This night no longer able to hold her,
Free from clock strikes now,
Midnight will not find her again,

Left it far behind,


On it’s own side of the dark.




__________________________________________

-Peace

Looking Up -13/11/2008

(Originally written/drafted August 2008)



He told you about his Ptolemaic system,
His knowledge,
On the ledge,
Trying to centre the world,
Within his world view again,
An un-shift not carrying for one,
In the equations bottom line.

He told you he’s flat-earthed,
From a place where there be dragons,
That he is Atlas-manning the last outposts,
Of this absurdly heavy world.

He told you the story of a world,
Created through accretions of a heavy mass stellar potential,
Says that he has spent a billion years,
Shuffling decks of cards,
Mixing recipes of acid burns,
To make proteins come good,
On an old promise.

He says he’s waiting,
A middle man for the cosmos,
A dancer in a nebula,
Foot printing species into fruition,
Then waiting in the wings,
For them to spread their wings.

Oh, he’s spun stories,
Revolving around echoes of silent lights,
In a fifteen-billion-year nighttime,
Says that he has swallowed each sunrise a thousand times,
For every thousand times,
He’s been looked at.

And he claims,
He is the night sky above,
So he really can see the stars,
When he looks into your eyes,
…through reflection.

He has told you all of this,
And you know,
He’s waiting for you to look up and return his gaze,
To share in his alleged star light.

He’s told you the whole story,
But you don’t look up,
And you’re yet to tell him,


Whether or not you actually believe any of this.






-Peace

Clan-Destined -12/11/08

We,
Sat in the shell of an old building,
Where more moments we are still creating,
From those defunct assembly lines,
No longer running,
And fresh perceptions are seen,
In those wreckages, wastes and unoccupied places.

We,
Dawdle in the dust and detritus,
The cracks and smashed glass,
And the literal-heaps of pigeon shit,
The scenic that we can see,
Salvaged and savoured,
In these abandoned spaces.

We,
Media misrepresented,
Mainly here to see,
The broken pieces of industrial redundancies,
Found as our adventure playground,
The hollow out burnt out,
See-through skeleton of a structure,
Through younger eyes,
Visions of an underground man,
Underdogs, up-dog party animals,

The other box-tickers
Anti-social solitude seekers,
Artists as a portrait of civil disobedience.


We,
Have fun far from madding crowds,
Out for the nights of our lives,
Your Big Brother left at home,
To baby-sit a reality,
We're beyond what television screens,
Head torches lighting the darker corners.
From blue stone-tunnel balloon shapes.
Down canal-scapes.

We,
The best of friends,
Starring in the strangest of stories,
Underneath a radar,
Radiating, fire working,
Beer drinking, air-guitaring,
Amateur photographing,
Suit wearing, award winning,
Man-hole popping
The boldly-going,
Urban exploring,
Organisation.

Re-contextualising the textures,
Of a breeze on your face,
Up a construction crane scaffold,
Up ladders looking down,
On a dock-lands light-up like Christmas trees,

Finders of beauty,
As few else in society,
Take opportunities,
Or the risk-daring to go see,
We the discontented,
In curious phrasing.

Seeking,
For a greater depth down,
Found the unique,
Obscure,
Alternative,
Above-and-below-all the adventurous therein.


We,
Know an all-nighter,
In a convoy of cars,
Parking lots by torch lights,
Huddling over street-directories on car roofs,

Concrete slants covered in wet footprints,
Worming our way down side pipes,
To grill rooms and gutter boxes,
And finally the exit holes.

Wanting it all,
We go get it,
Climb over it,
Dig under it,
Hide out in it, Pass out in it,
Get caught in it,
Then make a run for it.

We go a culture-shocking,
For some real-life capers,
Strange Saturday sagas,
All another way,
To take what matters,
Into our own hands.
Looking at society's strictures,
Those unimaginative not-so-grand plans,
And from that limited brief,
We've chosen to expand,


Because we,


Are the Cave Clan.


________________________________________________


Miss you guys.




-Peace

Terminus and Exodus (don't get me started...) -11/11/2008

Hello reader,

Well, jumping on the computer today, I created this new account for my blog in the time it took for my previous myspace blog to load up. Case in point, for why I am changing. No more advertising for the bands I don't listen to, status updates from people who use (phrases?) like 'lol', like that is punctuation, and who can't find the apostrophe on the keyboard, or the shift key for the word I.

I'm not a myspace person, or a youtube person, I'm not a chain emailing hey lets regurgitate a bunch of power point slide shows about love and kittens and you really are my best friend type of person, I'm not a name dropper for the indie bands that I guess I should have heard of by now. Because I haven't. I'm not up with things, across the issue, or knowing where its at. I'm not deliberately trying to define myself or triangulate my stance here simply by rattling of a list of negations. I'm not unaware of the irony. I'm not saying weather I'm writing this with a straight face, or what I'm wearing, or not, I'm not venturing guesses as to your attire right now either (but really...come one, have a bit of decency, geez). I'm not trying to string this out for its own sake. I'm not lying. I'm not nearly as funny as I think I am. I'm not gonna let that bother me. I-AM gonna let that bother you.
I'm not clever, not exactly stupid either, but you might not know it, I just have this kind of well... if the idea doesn't fit, use a bigger hammer approach to things.

I define irascible without being sure of exactly how to spell it. I made five or six attempts finding an address for this thing that wasn't taken (who the hell else wanted 'brainthatweighsatun' -that's not even how you spell... tonne. Ah never mind.

So here it is. The second blogging of Randall Stephens. You can reference all my previous stuff (about 170 entries going back to July 2006) at: www.myspace.com/brainthatweighsatun

I write poetry, or at least some crude bastardized vaguely hip hop-pun inspired version of it. I am not being self-deprecating (if a little deconstructionist and cutely post modern about it).

I'm currently travelling, today is the 201st day since I left my hometown of Melbourne, Australia, 8 countries down, 4 more to go. A not-so-small fortune spent in the last few months, and all so I can sit around Kathmandu wearing my Grandad's old cangoe, drink cheap coffee and scribble my way through the varying intellectual, emotional and physical instabilities I engender through these voyages. Interspersing that with the occasional travel observation, doomed-romance, religion-bashing or genuine piece of self-loathing. Of course, I do do a little more than this while on the road, but the above is the only activity that produces written material.

Uh, what else. I hate hippies but am slowly turning into one. I'm kind of left but can't stand most other lefties . I'll try and keep everything here as hypocritical and preposterous as possible, and you'll keep reading with that a mixture of enthusiasm and aghast disgust that I work to bring into this world. Deal?

...atta boy!
(or for that matter, girl, excuse me, woman, or non-gendered pronoun preferring type-person, or hermaphrodite or disembodied consciousness, evil spirit, hungry ghost, or vicious piece of software whom is randomly probing the net and found this blog and might hack into it to fill it with porn like my ex did once and I'm still mad about that okay maybe she didn't actually hack it but somehow knew my passwords but either way she outsmarted me and it was shit and I know it was ages ago and I should get over it but getting over things is not really what poets do because we are the lot of us by necessity histrionic crybabies without any emotional sophistication and if you were it would hardly make for interesting stories like for example that time I....) . Anyway, whomever or whatever you are, thanks for reading.

I will endeavour to entertain more than I offend, but that is by no means a promise.

Welcome aboard.




-Peace