The Happy and the Healthy

We need

To stop talking

About the rich

And the wealthy,

And start talking about

The happy

And the healthy

Collective Fear

Funny how,

With the amazing

Spectrum of colour,

We all paint

Our houses cream

Out of fear.

Religious Freedom 002

We had a vote on marriage equality

But the Christians couldn’t just stand there quietly

They had to have their share of attention

So, they made up religious freedom

So, they didn’t feel left out.

Poor Christians pout

It always has to be about them.

Claiming, more people want religious freedom

Than those who voted for equality.

Of course, they did,

(roll of the eyes) We all said.

Afternoon

The sun shines.

Golden,

Long afternoon,

Stretches toward tomorrow.

The melancholy of it going

Takes our sorrow

And prepares us

For another day.

Life

Life is,

Fresh butter,

And fresh honey,

On fresh bread.

Holding hands.

Sun on your face,

Your toes in the sand.

Cold water on your skin,

Your lovers grin.

Sometimes,

We overthink this thing.

Disco 1995 Good Times

Mid nineties disco was hot,

boom dahdi boom, dahdi boom, boom, boom.

Deep House,

doompa, dar doom, dar doom, doom, doom.

The sun shone down

and the sky was blue

doompa, dar doom, doom, doom, doom, doom

As we left the club

our eyes we'd rub.

Fuck me!

I cannot see.

We'd stumble and fall

I remember it all.

Monday morning

sunglasses and yawning

Stretching our threads

and scratching our heads

the world spun around us

with fairy dust and lust.

Then the 9 to 5 peak, 

would come into view, eek!

Monday morning spew

sometimes, it is better for you

And then we'd laugh

and point and gnaff

and thank the universe again

that we weren't one of them.

We were invisible

our dancing treats made us invincible

freaks at the freak show

having just been let out.

They looked at us

as if we were going to hell,

Ah, I remember it well,

we thought they were unwell.

Doomp, doomp, doomp, doomp, doomp,

still thumping in our brains

and we had enough in our veins,

to remain under the witches’ call.

We'd tumble into a taxi,

the suits were our patsy,

laughing and pointing again

we had no shame.

Sunglasses on.

Headphones

When people pass me in the street,

I always imagine they just vaporise

when they get somewhere behind me,

I’ve thought that for the longest time.

Monster

It’s good to bid farewell,

To another monster.

And the whole world says, "Harare!"

Joy

I love gospel music,

I hate its preoccupation with god.

Kind of ruins it for me.

Spring Days

Will I remember these days,

walking into the shimmering haze,

sun on my face,

happiness in my heart?

Spring.

Space.

Fresh air in my hair,

cool on my skin.

Perfume in the air,

not a care.

Blue skies.

Shadows dapple on the ground.

Everything is new again,

with a cool breeze

on a spring day.

Collective Outrage

Collective outrage

has replaced action.

Thoughts and prayers

are another excuse

for doing nothing.

Sign a petition,

preferably online,

you don't even have to leave your house.

And our conscious is clear.

The Breast Feeding Problem Is?

You make a big deal about woman breastfeeding.

It is inappropriate, it is disgusting, it is rude!

Your barely concealed dirty secrets swirling in full view.

It’s a problem!

But really, that problem is you.

Mummy be nice to me, mummy feed me, mummy make me feel good.

Sucking a woman’s titties freaks you, and takes you away.

Admit it mate, you want to jerk off when you see a woman’s breasts on displayed.

What else can it be?

I just can’t see?

I wish I could?

Detached

Peripatetic heart,

I like it like that,

people are dark.

You know, if you

never stop moving,

you never get hurt.

It is only

when you settle

that you get torn apart.

Skin Deep

We’ve all become such collective snowflakes,

there are trigger warnings now on information.

We’re happier with news that is fake,

if that’s what it takes,

to get us through.

Self focus is so intense.

Every CD has a language warning,

isn’t that a problem in itself?

And everything in the end

gets a positive spin

just in case there is money to be made. 

Religious Freedom 001

The religious types

feel free to criticise,

anyone they like

because belief in god

gives them that right.

But if they are criticised,

in return,

they call it bullying

and their outrage burns,

for eternity, one would assume,

isn’t that the way they say

it goes.

The big guy’s

Love thy neighbour

As your own?

When I Was Six... (Ed Sheeran)

It always seemed too late

to make a difference in my life,

I never really knew why.

I wanted to play piano

and sing into a mic.

I was six when I was told

I was too old for the keys,

my mum didn’t know

that wasn’t the case.

I was thirteen when

I stopped singing,

my voice having broke,

never to hold a tune again.

I was twenty when I got a guitar,

I taught myself in my room.

Not long after my housemate

smashed it, being dramatic,

and then it was too late.

But, I wrote it down from an early age,

that much I could save.

When I was six

I was told I couldn’t play the piano,

at that age, I was too old,

my mother wasn’t to know.

When I was thirteen,

my singing career came to a stop,

my voice broke,

I never sang another note.

When I was in year 12,

I was told, I couldn’t design buildings,

“You’re a business student." Shake of the head.

And I went to one of the best schools there is.

When I was twenty, I got a guitar,

I taught myself in my room.

Not long after my housemate

smashed it, being dramatic, and cute.

And, once again, it was too late.

But, I wrote it down from an early age,

that much I could save.

Connected World Problem

I find going everywhere with music and my headphones in,
Quiets my mind, stops the poetry that is just naturally writing there.


* Paul Kelly sang Before Too Long, and I couldn't think of anything to rhyme with long. Seemed like far too much irony to use song.

The sun shone, there was a cool breeze, the birds chirped in the trees.
Fresh air, not a care.

Going where?
Headphones across my hair
On the way to the supermarket with a list
My reusable bag in my fist.

Bread, juice and sultanas
I practically went in my pyjamas
Early morning, it is true
Rolled oats, milk and coffee to brew,
Home quickly to my baby
(that’s what breakfast today be)

That’s how it goes
It’s sweet
The two of us
Give and take

Paul Kelly sings, The Pretty Place

Sunday Morning

The birds chirp in the trees,

outside.

My partner plays a game at my knee,

click, click.

The dog sniffs and shifts about between us,

pant, pant.

My laptop warms my legs,

coffee still tastes on my lips.

Sunday begins.

Miss You

I miss you,

or at least, I think I do,

and I say I do,

as I try to convince myself

that I know what that means,

because I know I should,

know.

A belief in god

Does not give you the right

To treat other’s less

Cowboy Love… Willie Nelson

I grew up dreamin

Of being a cowboy

And lovin' in a cowboy way

Worryin' my mother

And troublin' my father

When I kicked the cupboard doors outa the way.

When somebody says

they love you unconditionally,

the question is,

Until when?

World

I worry about me

I wonder about my empathy

I don’t feel your pain

Shared History

We all revise history in our own favour

So, with your revision for you

And my revision for me

We should probably

Come to the truth.

What Happened To The Love… BB King

If you are going to walk all over my heart, baby,

the least you can do is take off your shoes.

How can you hate me so much,

when we were once hopelessly in love?

The Man At The Next Café Table

It’s such a shame

We speak different languages

We miss small niceties,

Sitting at two tables alone.

His lovely turn of phrase, with a wink

Italian, I think.

He said something nice,

I am sure,

But I will never really know.

His smile, his gentle eyes,

Gave it away, in kind.

His grey hair, with a wave,

His pasta and wine,

His bow-tie divine.

His olive skin with lines.

My shrug,

His look resigned.

Euthanasia

If you can’t get yourself

Into the city, you have always known

Treat yourself to lunch,

Like you always have

And get yourself home again,

On your own

Let’s face it,

It is time to die.

Broken Heart

Peanut butter fills the cracks

Of a broken heart,

On your really bad days

Cheesecake can be used as glue.

Wet Kiss

Never kiss a man in a canoe

Nothing good can come of it for you

Over shoot, and you’ll easily get wet.

Let go of his fishing rod. Smoke a cigarette

Tattoos

We’re so bored with our lives

We are scribbling all over ourselves

I’m not sure if it is for individuality

Or self-loathing and disgusted

Before We Met

Tell me the thing you regret?

It’s not that I wish we’d met

Any time before we did

But what did we do waiting there?

I can’t remember life before you and me

It seems strange to contemplate

Haven’t I always known your face

Sitting there filling up my space?

Haven’t I always known you

It feels that way to me

What were we before we met

Is that what you regret?

Mum

I understand you

Now that I am your age

As I sit on the edge of the bed

In the night, it dawns on me

That you were really quite young

When your husband died

And you lived the rest of your life

Alone

No Cure In Sight

Religion is like a virus,

But unlike AIDS

And the homos plight,

There is no cure in sight

Death

Death is such a weird thing

It is possibly considered the most import thing in your life,

Although you are the person it affects the least.

Gay

I never shoot to stun

I always shoot to kill

I was just born that way

The rainbow genes in-stilled

Dinosaurs

God almighty, how can it be a choice?

to go against everything that is right? And Good?

The all powerful? It is not logical.

“How could ‘they’ have been made in his image" 

“just like you and me, it can’t be right,” 

says the god-botherer with a snarl. 

“It has to be a choice, because only then can “we” 

justify our beliefs, only then can we go on 

on our journey of ‘us’ being right. 

All god’s creatures, they can’t be one of them. 

It doesn’t hold up, what we learned on Sunday, 

what my mother and her mother and her mother before.

  

What they believed, it makes it all a joke. 

Those queers are the work of the devil, we know, 

we believe that, it has to be true. No, it can’t be a choice. 

We don’t believe it. And our belief is god. 

The good book says so, when we read it 

our way. And our way is right. We know.

"It’s not a choice, that we make. No.

it is our way of life. We believe. We believe.

It is not our choice to make." No, it is not.