There's No One Around/Morning Drizzle/Lunar Waste/Point of Incident/Thousandaire/Desert Island

An extract from an epic prose poem written between 1991 and 1997.

Point of Incident

Every day people

go out

with the intention of

doing something

everyone will

hear about.

Deposits of calcite crystals

beneath the Moon.

This

is not a lie.

Everything is the truth.

Everything contains nothing.

Encyclopaedia of hate,

blend back

into the ground.

Incoming fire station bomb reports:

seven per hour.

Ants now inhabit

the overturned hour glass,

someone is speaking

to everyone,

no one

is listening.

In collusion

with the unknown participant

a monger at both the cradle

and the casket,

a figure whose shadow

drapes centuries.

They’re never coming

back look,

mouse implant,

strychnine roses.

A wristwatch on a length of arm

between two fists,

a fish hook implanted.

The flashing illusion strobe

of encounter/experience.

Written

by street lamp.

Written in

the dark.

Welcome, to the night,

contents: an unknown quotient.

Down the illusionist’s corridor.

Blunder experiment.

Sequential signature tablature.

Enough

must become

satisfactory.

One hundred and fifty years

in space.

Lower swamp abattoir.

Midnight builders.

What exists

between the lens

and the eye piece

in the telescopic chamber?

In memoriam of the five a.m.

tombstone shadows, hurled,

replied and sighed.

We’re all waiting

for the news.

The human Minotaur

expanding labyrinth

of perception.

This could be

the night.

Rivers

and streams

of mortal thought.

And now live!,

via satellite, the fat man eats!

It is a flame,

once lit,

there remains,

to be announced,

please ensure that you read

the following

important

enclosed information.

Firing arrows

into the Sun,

trying to affect

the Moon,

the horror

of the frontier

within,

the curve

of the skull

or the curve

of the earth,

eyes which open to emit

light, wolves

blue fur,

nectarine palisade,

pulsating static strobes,

brave wolves.

An impostor

at the teat.

The pyramids here

are dead.

Catharsis metamorphosis,

gelatinous clouds

blue underbelly.

Night sweats.

Birth

should never

be filmed.

Invoices and keys

of lightning,

twenty seven hundred

unsymboled movements

beneath the wash basin.

He’ll respond with a hand gesture,

preparing for half-life.

Machine blade

key strokes,

pounding the lawn

with its androgynous,

metal insect form,

an odd, mysterious novelty

to the children

at the nineteenth century

garden party.

That chick

with wings again.

Broken rubber band,

moving

with the force

of a mountain peak,

magnetic forces inverted,

on the day

genius is proven

wrong.

Thousandaire

Storm siege,

key word,

the notes

of August,

polymer emulsiphate,

ripple splatter, wet

cart wheel

pressing the dead grass

under the snow,

golem news readers

broadcasting

irrelevant news.

Crime:

to have

become

apparent.

Dates

to be announced.

Vocation:

perjury.

We have followed

a path

made by

a series

of interconnecting

meadows.

Leopard’s stamp,

handle crank press,

velveteen oracle.

I am witness

to the emotional probe,

exiting this

solar system.

Funereal melody,

light emanating

a party which never ends

you just leave the party,

polymer orchid

grinding.

I still

believe,

we will

never know,

the future is

yesterday.

I had nothing

and now

it’s gone,

never going

to explode

look.

What

happens to me?

What

ever you think.

Recognising

the unavoidable

truth,

there’s no

security even

with you here,

mortality tables.

Last night

the compass

needle whirled,

erratically twirled.

It was three

years ago

tonight

I took

your hand,

listened to

your ears,

in a trance.

Page

unknown,

sixty seven paces

uptown,

location

and dates

unknown,

calamity. If

the wind changes

your face

will stay

like that,

radish bulb

dray horse,

thief water

horse, plumage

of green vine,

a term

of endearment,

apartment building,

soul out

on the river,

popularity amongst addicts

of urban areas,

tin geese.

Life on the mud flats, Venice TV

that sequence was

a speech

from a film

narrative.

Washing hands,

hair,

face

in a car

park

puddle.

Joy to us was

cotton mouth’s antidote

pouring

from the broken

back

lot

water

main.

Solar vernacular, the Moon

like a curved skull.

Like

the scent

of a woman

who departed, only

a trace.

It’s the same

only

the names

have been

changed.

It takes

two people

to verify assuredly

that anything is real.

The mind has the ability

to coat any object in gold.

This is why

our thoughts

are more precious

than pure gold.

What lies ahead?

Where you never go.

How do you come back?

The desire

to cessate desire.

Sequential fixed narrative critique,

subcutaneous narrative.

I want you tell me

something that will make me

feel like everyone else.

Throwing a band aid

at the mass

of blood.

When does a child become an adult?

Three year olds know

about the bomb,

unaware of the stolen

treasure, escaping Earth’s gravity,

spelling out

the letters in blood,

shall we remain

fashionably late?

Tomorrow

you will not

be going,

neither will I.

Hollow and empty

cubic spires

filled by warmth and light

with crowds of figures

under the night rain huddled

in cardboard boxes

at the heels of

their bases.

Storm seeds.

Alert to the light-keeper's report,

the wick is snuffed.

The first man to arrive

after the shooting.

Considered an appropriate way to end

a political convention.

The drive to rule

may be motivated by an anxiety

of disorientation which instills the desire

to command at a degree

responsively proportionate in measure

to the depth of confusion.

I realised one night,

laughter is tears,

according to the shadow

men and what ever

the voices say.

The battle

for the refuse zone.

Farm land

beneath the road,

Sun times five,

the limping crowds.

A bird fleeted

from beneath

my lapel.

At dawn in the movie house

a drop of orange syrup

congealed in the waxy cup

to become more sticky

below

a seat in aisle fourteen

under the glow

of the exit sign.

A queue on the forest

track, they made it through

in the eighty fifth hour,

emulsion. Waves,

wings, oars, diamond

beaches. We have been

made wasters.

I’ll be forgetting

the rest

of my life.

Butterfly wings

in flame, framed

Four Towers. The night

regret translated

into learning. Milk

of amnesia.

The richest man

in the world still

sucks his thumb.

Forests explode

broomsticks into

the air, a child mentions

speculation, hold thought.

Students enter

the small town

fishing competition. One hundred and fifty seven

paces across town, generated stillness

in absentia,

aerial smugglers negotiating

the alpine obstacles.

The incarcerated have been removed from society

to invalidate their freedom of expression.

Never before in history have so many been ruled by so few.

Head knocked to sleep by impact with the pillow.

Metal plant seeds, sheaves of iron wheat.

Rebounding from the trampoline,

citric tangerine, cocoon,

sound blowing,

not going anywhere,

caves yet to be mapped,

machine code, diagrams on hotel napkins,

golf club resort bar,

road block between May and December nineteen seventy eight,

languages to be invented,

voices prepared to invoke,

debris which escapes off set,

double jinx.

Romance is a pink paper

cut out heart

lying there

on the foot path.

Spiced air,

skulls with horns,

synthetic water,

portent,

eclipse,

finale.

Sun in crisis.

Down to the edge of the sea

at the end of school,

skirting at the edge of every perimeter,

at the other end of the attic,

ingrained in memory oscilloscope.

It is not the same sun

beneath which we sit.

It is possessed.

Last night we laughed

and now the sun is beating down

upon our heads.

Revised edition

of the revelatory experience,

the truth of the unique and individual Sun,

hurled fire vessel,

bodies of flame, fire storm approaches

apple blossom, ravine suspended

at the gravitational equilibrium.

The ancients spoke of the day

when man would chase away the c**k

for crowing at the dawn.

Lactogen, antiseptic,

skateboard bowl, we can turn the earth

into a car park, for fifteen dollars

she’s dead.

Newspaper food,

chain link fence,

dirt bowl,

grids fan out.

She’s driven to the source of the bell.

Each day the free floating thoughts

and dreams billowed

over the mountain’s crest.

Each day we cheat death,

ever wanting.

Sleep, the new land.

Ninety nine per cent of studies conclude

that people want what is free,

but won't take it.

Acrylic emulsion, information beaches,

seven second theory.

Every seven seconds

we could be free,

now the ravens have blinded them,

rings of coloured lights traverse the ocean bed,

conducting between two terminals,

runes across the tops of the finance buildings,

sinister shadow plays

on the harmonium harbour quay.

All the birds sing the same song of the humans' mangled logic.

Beach side crustaceans rise on the automated elevating stairs,

chewing gum of deception, I

t was a strange new language

that one day everyone would speak,

barrel roll of purple and yellow sea stripes,

seaweed ocean garden’s gate,

unintelligible among wires

to web and blacken the sky.

Lyrical,

swinging,

roaring rhythm, imparted

to dispense a desperate,

sensation driven meandering, diamond clusters

borne by the mermaids’ to hurl.

Final missing chapters

down the wire.

We have arrived

at the appointed destination on the map.

To be a soldier is to be a lover

obsessed with the passion of desire.

Late one night it arrived,

one day it came.

At midnight

on the one hundred and thirty eighth day

this will all become clear.

Rivers and streams of alcohol,

the sun would melt.

City lights make stars invisible.

A day dream among the wires.

Roll end credits.

Back of the airport highway poplars,

grey leaden slush ash

in the city snake’s guts.

Hard to forget

tidal wave.

Momentary consciousness

in the anonymous reflection of silence.

All was as usual,

there was nothing there.

Morning Drizzle

This is the temporal universe

in which we are entreated

to coagulate our web.

A girl named ‘Tomorrow’

running along the highway

and beckoning to the cars to stop.

Billboard’s awkward narrative.

The mystery of superficiality

ensures security of repetition

endearing the concept of permanency.

To be alive with a voice scented by baby’s vomit.

Up periscope,

service runners, unsuspecting,

unsuspecting the stolen treasure.

Tapestry unravelled to possess a single thread,

held up in the fire light of the mahogany hearth

of convenience and then thrown in.

Every day is the same day,

the twenty-ninth of May.

Rat area,

urban guerilla,

monkey rat problem.

Storm crashing

into an airy eucalyptus sea.

The girls in their sashed yellow polka dot dresses

rush passed to escape the cracking forks

of the approaching phosphorescent clouds

orange, enamel amber, flakes projected

from the interior

of a falling bauble.

He must be fed by another or else

he will spindle and fall, going to the zoo

every day, enjoying the high.

For every invented contraption

there is a concealed thought

implanted by an unknown participant,

a parlour trick.

Glow in the dark stars.

Sea shells bronze patina.

When you go

I’ll do the opposite.

The point between pleasure and pain.

Directionless, wind born.

Matter is the key

to the heart note.

Chopped filaments, rising,

writhing in ether.

We have now been waiting

for two hundred and forty eight days.

Telephone activated recorded message

in the abandoned farm house

to deceive and lure the caller.

The day after he left

the men in sunglasses arrived

inquiring about his location.

They departed,

vaporous beneath the sun.

The shadow men.

Rushing down the illusionist’s corridor

at full speed.

Lubricating fluids arcing,

ground to smoke.

They bow and worship the flames

and the hamburger wrappers that fuel this fire

in the over run children’s playground

beside the hamburger outlet.

The feral dogs left the hills

and surrounded the plague racked city.

Daubs of ointment.

Train line to the stars.

The sixty eight babies

to be announced

voices invoke machine lightning

pouring from the yard

shone through the doorways

thirty centimetre portal.

Acquire something beautiful

as life progresses,

as night chases day,

so the story ends.

There’s a shark in the canal,

mud eyed river shark,

cantaloupe rings of blue ice fire,

keys set in ice,

diving from the high board

into the pool of molten lava.

Space pirates, an ulterior history of the universe

illustrating the subcutaneous narrative

avoiding specification of the world,

exclude nothing.

Twirling barber’s pole,

a shark in ether,

from the platform the fire storm rises,

they will never return here.

Two humanoid life forms required.

The earth has a place

to lay to rest.

I was never really here

and have until now,

said nothing.

No two candles emit the same light.

Each candle’s flame is unique.

The door perforated, blasted from its hinges.

A plan for the machines that will provide for us forever,

that is, until the end of this world.

The sun would melt

rushing up, indelible

at the edge of sleep.

What does not allow a definition.

A night among the vines.

How can we expect our children to take our places

when we ourselves have been destroyed?

Fire flower, power show.

The ocean blue a pool of azure eyes.

Sleep, making life easy,

head band, snow funnel,

the Way of All Flesh street,

amplitude of brazen

strawberry lip gloss.

Please close your eyes.

You’ll never get all those people into space.

Suffering expires,

June nineteen seventy eight,

washed up newspaper,

ponderous,

pulverised,

sinking material.

Try taking a breath.

Gleaning the ether

from the sleepers’ dreams.

His body felt as uncomfortable

as a three day old suit.

If life is a constant search for pleasure

all of its sources become depleted.

Towering twelve month

is withered to a stalk.

b. What is wrong with this picture?

He is buying afternoon tea for two people

who have made an appointment

in a movie on TV.

The custard ship takes three days to arrive at port,

yet it is a destination that can be walked to

just around the corner.

The students at the university manufacture the canned lemonade

but are unwilling to give refunds or exchange.

The song he’s going to write is for a girl he’s neither seen nor met

and she continually phones him.

His inheritance of thirty thousand didn’t change his appearance.

They’re dipping their fingers into the wine glasses

with white gloves on in an opulently aristocratic manner

wearing wigs and spectacles.

It’s red wine.

The day bird awoke at midnight.

Public property space marked

please print clearly

speech balloon

carrot top

ripped map

few weeds

under lined

swathed in night.

Drawings from photographs.

The correct answer

may be almost

impossibly difficult.

They’re trying to tell you

it was all an accident.

The purpose of life

is to help someone else.

Every proven fact

creates another series of questions,

serrations.

The celebration of youth

pathalogicises adulthood.

You are now alone.

How many keys do you carry?

The secret of life

is to know there is a secret.

A line marked ‘start/finish’.

The highway dwellers.

Writing columns of words

as though there was an indentation

left by the subcutaneous narrative

similarities to the society

in which the individual is established

exploited by the barrage

of the Hollywood film icon rationale.

Moments, when established by this mechanism,

cause a speculation on the conceptual dividend

of attaining perception of the present moment.

The objective left indelibly

like the process of a sinking branch.

The popularity of sport is an example

of the clearly objectifiable desire

for the ultimately definitive

because it offers a conclusive

'win or lose' outcome

situation with each game.

Rows of yellow blossomed feather trees,

their reams

of antique

petal blossoms

dilapidating

in a gravitational encounter

to create

escaping

liquid rings

on the pollen-slick

laden

pond’s skin.

Studies of the cardboard casings

of temporary dwellings

and their structural susceptibility

to the weight of collected rain.

Where do you go

when the wind blows?

There is a man who lives alone

in a hidden street

who speaks very few words

to anyone except

when he is at work of a night.

Pencil pines needled fragrant the winds,

billowing in the waves, Moon streak, as though a second ago

I could have made it

yesterday, remembering

the underlying key to perception,

the cyclonic frequencies of change

unrelentingly provoked

by the episodic

continuum of night and day.

Why if we must die

do we have a desire

to live for ever?

Why do we live in a state

that is full of oppositional dualities

between what we desire

and what we have?

Lunar Waste

That is only the back gate

banging in the wind.

The clouds move when you take your breath.

In dreams

people are some times

depicted without

being able

to communicate or express themselves

in any way.

He is the hotel loafer, acting like he is meant to be there

but just visiting.

Alone on the eleventh floor one evening

he descended the corridors to the ground

walking passed every room. Some vacant,

others with barely audible, blown in from out of town

families and package deal twelve hundred

dollar junior accountants.

Five passed twelve am, her hair’s red

coagulated coiled veins,

the twenty fifth floor, recycled

invisible scented extracts.

What is freedom?

An indoor snail

its shell affixed for winter

to the aerial cable on the wall behind the TV.

A house that you’ve lived in for three years

on the night a light appeared

in the centre of the purple rose.

The sea slit to reveal molten liquid

gold sheets washing, submerged,

rhythmically peeling back the waves

as it lifts up between them.

Above, the sun, a launched bulb disc, flare, jettisoned

briny filaments escaping as it wafts

like a sea born, fiery bubble.

How could this be the same sun

beneath which everyone sits?

When we arrived back in the city

there was a column of smoke from a fire front

fifty kilometres away obscuring the sky.

It poured down the hills

on either side of the river

on top of the water moving

toward the city.

She’s running

through the doorway.

Strings of lights

above the slot machines hurricanes.

Don’t you want to leave anything behind?

When you see a Hollywood movie there is a conceptual space I

n the possibilities of the dramatic generation

so you pay your five bucks

and sit down.

When you make an international telephone call

there is an electronic cavern the size of the earth

and your voice is bounced from mirror

orbiting in space.

There was a lady,

she was going to tell you something,

she’s gone now.

A ladybird.

Relics of conversation

smashed marble colonnades,

holding open a book and speaking out loud,

but no sound coming from her mouth.

Who lit the fire?

These flowers are for you.

It’s still got a bit left in it

every morning when he awoke.

A sixteen foot tall feather.

A lampshade corridor of doorways.

“I love women.”

“I love women, too.”

I’m not paying one dollar

and ninety eight cents

to sit here.

It was impossible to ignore.

A small bell ringing somewhere

far away

that drew me

with uncertainty.

It fell silent when I was in its immediate vicinity.

But that was thirty years ago

when they used to have a show.

I wonder what they’re doing to you.

Isn’t that beautiful?

Night of the axe.

Upon arrival

beset with the desire to escape.

The ghost trapped at the pinnacle.

Dreamed of the silhouetted roofs

of the torn saw toothed warehouses in the distance.

The slowly revolving motorised neon signs on the buildings.

City evacuated for the week end.

In an inconspicuous space

of the castle’s vacant and shuttered attic

there was a crack in the wall

from all of the water seeping down

over the centuries from a nail hole in the roof.

It was an attic junk room,

filled with light passing through the glass face

of the enormous clock which composed one wall.

The numerals were all reversed.

A never before discovered

dust and grease carpeted

monolith clockwork mechanism.

Glow in the dark tape,

do not cross, gymnasium,

zebra crossing.

The season shortened

ozone bunting

sparks across the grid.

There was a man who spent each day

reading the newspaper

until he found

that he could no longer

move around

or find the way out

of his house

because of the volume

of all

of the old

newspapers.

The storm

has now been approaching

for five days.

We’ve lost contact

with the ship.

Tearing down the highway

in the direction of the seaside.

It means something.

Handsome cardboard carrying case.

A future archaeological dig

on our present day tip sites

may reveal the reasons

for the end of this civilisation.

When you watch the television

or read the news

what is not there

reveals the true agenda.

They’re good at making flames.

The never come home brothers.

She was afraid, and so she opened her eyes.

Here is a list of some of the objects

that have fallen into the ocean

in the last twenty minutes;

bus tickets,

admirals’ hats,

salami,

gold (real, faux and fools'),

magic cards,

magnifying glasses,

plastic bags,

ice creams,

umbrellas,

stethoscopes,

wedding rings,

swords,

stolen manuscripts,

video tapes,

fried chickens,

abacuses,

bicycles,

goblets,

ropes,

coins,

prosthetic limbs,

trees,

ash trays,

bullets,

anchors,

televisions,

tubes of liniment,

hooks,

tables,

rubbish bins,

suitcases,

pianos,

guns,

pies,

kites,

cars,

coffins,

stones,

records,

rag dolls,

statues,

wigs,

bananas,

toilet rolls,

computer discs,

motor mowers,

ear rings,

lollipops,

contact lenses,

cans,

cigarettes,

scissors,

thermoses,

torches,

clocks,

laptop computers,

paintings,

satellites,

egg beaters,

toy roulette wheels,

tea bags,

bricks,

light bulbs,

row boats,

darts,

shoes,

cameras,

jackets,

books,

syringes,

bowling pins,

T-shirts,

houses,

pens,

false teeth

and

people.

There's No One Around

The landscape is turning into a wilderness.

The people who would not recognise the sources of the fragrances

wafting from the restaurant above which he lives

will not be reading this.

Crashing the party by scaling the ivy coated stucco wall.

This is my pet mouse.

He made sure to go and buy a one dollar fifty suit the very next day.

She found out that there was place where you could play ‘Twenty One’ for money.

She undid her bow to put it into her handbag as she sat down at the edge of the green felt table, whilst smiling so very innocently.

Yours sincerely.

Tomorrow it will be misty in Bombay.

Knowledge alone cannot save us.

There’s the phone.

The smell of puppies on her fingers.

One dollar per second.

Discarded and unread comics.

The loss of responsibility

in the Monday morning shopping mall.

Do not forget.

You won’t be going on the news.

I was over here

you were over there

and he was in the corner.

Only when you have nothing

can something priceless come from your fingers.

It was hard to draw a cartoon after that.

He was performance artist putting on an exhibition in solitude,

wearing pyjamas beneath his day clothes.

This could not be foreseen

as the passing of time

had forced the inevitable change.

The eucalypts and bottle brushes had been transmogrified

into tropical jungle plants butted up against each other

so tightly that no light could penetrate beneath them

to where the earth remained slimy and cold.

There had been a land slide on the side of the road

where the beach lay.

Melting wet chunks of gluggy clay

coloured lemon yellow with orange rind

like layers striped through them made the clffs,

the brilliantine colours struck our eyes

when we rounded the steep corner in the road

appearing against the backdrop of the foaming blue sea.

I let my weight dangle on the bus’s hand rail to forget my body

and to take the scene in as fully as possible.

It was the kind of sight that makes you want to live,

to despise every moment spent in idle sorrow

refusing to seek the experiences that make up a fulfilling life

to look back upon.

We came upon a section of land where stood the remains of small stone cottages

surrounded by s patches of underbrush.

The bus stopped for us to take photographs.

It was the last day of the fair,

everything was either broken, rusted, dirty, dented

or in combinations of these conditions.

Broken pipe dream pieces,

six for two dollars.

I haven’t talked like this before yet.

While I’m waiting for you

I’m watching her hair

flashing against the sky

like another cloud

through the cafe venetians.

Released the pressure dial

she sings about being trapped in the vinyl

I was over here trembling

helping you to feel outside.

It was minor interruption

on a highway where you have never sat before

where every person knows you

as the stranger.

I knew she was watching

as the flower crumbled

and was washed away

on a hot day

there was broken glass

you have never

been here before

you have not seen me yet

when I arrived to become

what you didn’t know yet,

it was the day after the explosion,

everyone was wearing their sunglasses.

I’m telling you now

somewhere near the end.

I forgot to tell you

how hard it was to forget.

He just comes in every day

and sits down beside the window.

No one ever talks to him

on account of his disposition.

He was my friend

despite what my friends said.

I would never go there again.

It was going to be a long night

with the breeze.

It was too late

for facial exercises.

I fell asleep

no matter what the newspaper said.

I used to tell her she’s going to cause and accident

because she drives so slowly.

You pick up a stick,

the tree trunk twisted by its circular basking chase of the Sun,

it has come from the centre of the trunk,

liberated by the crashing fall.

It’s all back to front said Mr. Tree,

who was not prepared to commit.

Ruined the dinner party

with a computer virus

by constantly ripping out a note book

and recording observations.

That rich man stole my eyes.

A guided midnight tour

of the head space,

without milk.

There’s that bird singing again.

Welcome to the tip of my finger

coin slot

where did you go?

She was reading the phone book

when she found an old photo.

He looked into her eyes

and the stars reflection distorted

as the bucket bobbed

at the bottom of the well.

Untouched since the twilight.

It is intrinsic to human nature to be rebellious,

otherwise we would not need the police.

The latter part of the twentieth century

has provided little in the form of legitimate physical outlets

for this rebellion in youth, in whom it is most often extremely pervasive.

And so, the consumption of drugs has become the physical,

political, social and psychological grounds

for the outlet of this rebellious spirit,

particularly given their illegal status

and the common side effect

of creating an utter and complete apathy

in those who are dissipated

by the unavoidable duties

necessarily involved in fulfilling the requirements

of their ongoing addiction.

Rebellion quashed!

Any youth may today emulate their favourite rock star

in completeness by overdosing and dying

on the very same drugs that may have killed their hero.

A man standing on top of a building

with an arrow passing through his shoulder.

Put everything

on nothing.

The newspaper was entitled, 'The Age'.

When he wrapped it around himself

and slept the night in the park it kept him warm.

This was written

using a pencil

from a toddler's

aeroplane trip

complimentary

colouring-in book

accessory set.

This is the feeling

that comes upon you

when you go back

to the house you were brought up in

and find instead

a four lane highway.