The Lucky Country

Australia Day,

when privileged white folk

congratulate themselves

for a life well lived,

while the indigenous people,

the poor,

and the homeless,

live rough,

locked up,

or hungry.

God Is…

God is

my parents,

and their parent’s,

Conditioning.

God is an anxiety blanket,

we forgot to put down as adults

God is relief,

I don’t have to think.

God is delusion,

only my god is true?

God is Santa Clause,

21st Century.

God is everything,

some say.

That’s code for nothing,

let’s face it.

Dust

Life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease,

I know this is glib, but it is not far from the truth.

Four score years and seven seems like a lot,

and for the first score that is probably true.

But then it goes so quickly, you'd be excused

for your head spinning and a sense of disappointment

Pervading your old bones, as you creak

as you get up and walk to the grave alone.

All of your yesterday's folding up and collapsing

like an origami narrative disintegrating and falling to dust,

lying like soft ash under foot,

the only evidence that you ever were.

Big blow, fffffffff and you are gone,

and everyone you knew before you,

shadows in your memories

all fading to black. Dust, we all become.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year,

isn't it queer,

how the years roll around

faster and faster every year.