Join the Dots -7/4/2014

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no telling where the dirty mattress
left on my driveway had came from
but the way I join the dots... yeah
fucking hate my neighbours

even if it wasn't actually them
and even if it hadn't been pissed on
wanted to piss on it myself
stick it over their fucking door

luckily for both me and them
I have my Dad's ute
to get it away from here
before I can stew on it
figure on my way to pick him up
I'd dump it in wastelands
behind the airport
to hell with paying
City Councils get enough money
out of me as it is
or some other equivocal shit
I don't know

killed a lot of time behind the airport
to avoid paying for parking
it's vast and quiet and dark
and an ex-girlfriend
and I used to fuck near this one fence line
and it was hot and when I got there
I saw a sign saying
'area monitored, no dumping'.

I remember stockinged thighs
steamed windows
rocking suspension
stupid Bloody zips
and the scaly sounds
of barb wire fence shaking,
but not that sign

we never got caught

but the sign doesn't say no fucking
and factory lights over the hill
make me get nervous

the lid of my fathers car
sits pensively up
a crocodiles waiting jaws
or an open fly's zipper,
and I feel exposed

drive further down the road
running late now
throw the filthy fucking mattress
over some filthy fucking paddock fence
it wasn't hard
I didn't feel guilty
not really

Dad talks to me about his trip
to Papau New Guinea
(he installs IT stuff for bankers)
and all the big business over there
mining and cocoa and forestry
how all the locals are dangerous
how he had to stay in a compound
when not working
how one of his co-workers
got a machete to the head by the locals
and had to fly home

I taunt him it that it sounds like Avatar
he doesn't take my meaning
about bad-guys and maybe
these people and places should be left alone
he says the missionaries
did the real damage over there
and we talk about Aztec books
being burnt by good Christians,
and the new exhibition
as I turn onto the freeway ramp
we're now talking safer territory

he's not mad that I'm late
because I told him about
the illegal dumping, he approves
because he hates city councils too

he tells me about barb wire
being a way of life over there
as it probably is in Africa too
(dad's never been to Africa, far as I know)
then he rants about Manus island
not being so bad,
better than the jungle
and I wiggle in this seat
saying nothing

he knows
the work I did with refugee
but not why

I know
the work he does means
Dad pays more in tax each
than I earn
each year
and he joins dots... differently than I

he's in a good mood
glad to be home
out of danger
rubbish we talk
dark and oh so empty out here

wonder if someone
did piss on that mattress
if someone ever saw us fucking
if there are tapes of it
wonder if I'd watch them
given a chance
or if I got busted
dumping out here
or why I ever bother
arguing politics in the abstract

nothing means anything
or holds points together
like a closed mouth

it's dark and late
the only point I have to make
is a home address
the only dots I have to join
are freeway light
these are running
along all the barb wire fences
blurring inky-blue-dark
out the window

alongside us.

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