Thursday, June 30, 2016

Susan Hawthorne #182 potentialities

each phrase is filled with potentialities
it depends on what you mean
your interpretation    is your mind on the job?
are you some weird abstract/ion    blue
on green

              there is an opaque universe out
there somewhere    shadow overtaking
light/ning    it could be a gesture of the eyes
a dance such as Indians perform with
intense/ity

Barbara Temperton #29 - Cruising X: Phuket, Thailand (Lucky)


Three times in Phuket I lost things
and they were returned by strangers.
Lens-hood lost at Promthep Gap
during naval commemoration, returned
by Thai man wearing black-gold epaulettes.
Reading glasses lost at Wat Chalong
during noontime prayers, returned
by Thai youth wearing Brooklyn t-shirt.
Hat, lost at Port Phuket
just prior to boarding, returned
by Thai tour guide, her name was Lucky.
I was three times lucky in one day, 
Thank you means khob khun kha, Phuket.

Red Cone(LF)#178-a winter's day



a winter's day

cold and wet
a chill wind blows
days are short
sun soon goes

trees bare branches
fallen leaf dances
skeletal grey structure
wind clings and clutches

wind blown street
a morning walk
fresh and brisk
warm coffee and talk

clouds are racing
downpour sudden
sodden from top to toe
winter will not let go

time to ponder
winter's wonder

Claine Keily # 30 Capital

She is not thin
and her yellow dress
sticks to her

She likes men
who smoke
and so they sleep together
she loves the black fringe
that disguises his eyes

"What is this game
you are playing?" he says
to her one morning
before she can rise
and with make up
erase the dark circles
from under her eyes

She notices her feet
under the blanket
pointed like a ballerina's
and she begins to cry

When he asks her
about her plans
to establish some
capital
she replies
that for her
it is not possible
as she finds it hard to lie



Kerri Shying # R2 Coppertone Ride


Coppertone Ride

Copper as the curve of the under balcony
the tan the fourth form strove for, 
socks rolled down behind the canteen, by the industrial arts room
the presence of the boys
a mere coincidence

the stickyness of memory
biochemical italics
favouring the sheen of fine blonde hairs
over the short fawn nylon socks

alighting at Cronulla I expect the waft of coconut oil to seize me by the face
only riot somewhere in my heart
burnt feet waiting at the Shelley Beach Kiosk
 the Gunnamatta baths

the train, decked in surplus prison livery
remembers the moss and lets the musty waft of soil
ride.



Robert Verdon, #191, Dejecta membra


I see a branch that easily fits between thumb and forefinger
A rock-wallaby facing the troops on a parade ground
An endless lens of perception less substantial than air
A transparent flag
A famous poet sleeping with his mouth open at the end of his life
A politician with a mind like a steel sphincter
An archaeopteryx pictured in Odham’s Children’s Encyclopaedia
A flurry of semi-superimposed literary images, including the biography of Tom Thumb
A Great War tank on a polished floor
A walking stick with a worn handle at Vinnies
Any lost tail of a blue-tongue
A sliced worm becoming two brain-eating amoebae
A pan full of sunrays
A chlamydomonas, predator with biting mouthparts
A quizzical persimmon engaged to a kiwifruit
A dreg and a pair of singularities
And I could go on and on and on

#30 A Single Spur by Emma McKervey

A Single Spur

The air is muggy with platters of cow parsley and elderflower,
the pollen stirred from stamen by the breeze and looking for a bee.
Each breath is laden with the taste of these flowers,
weary after witnessing the sweep of hawthorn to Queen Anne’s lace
which had populated the hedgerows until June and whose petals
drifted down midst the thrusting stalks of the new summer arrivals.

It wont be until Autumn that the bones of that pathway will be seen,
until the stupefied bees can move no more.
The hills will darken then, the spines of blackthorn reduced to silhouette
unified in the dusk, although occasionally a single spur
will raise its splintered prong to the moon.



So this is my last poem of my month's writing for this blog (posting two today due to a slight technical hitch on the 1st June). Thank you all so much for your kind comments and support, I shall continue to read the blog as it travels on through the year. The standard of the work has been incredible and i am amazed how those of you who have undertaken the challenge for the whole year are so unerringly innovative and creative in your writing every single day. Emma

Sarah St Vincent Welch #176 For the artists of Project 366




I touch the weft with my fingertips
searching the pattern
learning your song as you weave
wanting to sing along

in the echoes in the tunnel
us buskers
play around
call out
respond

I stutter and you understand 

you run, I chase

slip away in

a two step rhyme
we slow dance  
you are ever before me
laying out my dreams
teasing with a bright thread
passing me the shuttle

I leap to catch

Lizz Murphy - Poem 182: get your gear ...




get your gear around
a beer laugh your stock hats off
pig in a permanent grin 




No animals were harmed in the making of this post

#29 Needles of Bone by Emma McKervey

Needles of Bone

She wonders if this is productive enough
when what she wanted was nothing
except maybe to learn how the men shoot
snot from one nostril, pinning the other shut.
It seemed unfair when all she had was her hem.
In the damp corner of a field, seeking warmth
from the heaped hay she found the bones of a bird,
more substantial than if it had been the stripped bones
of a stolen fledgling the magpies had taken 
to ease the dark hunger in themselves.
The larger bones would make a fine needle
she could not help but think, but as she worked
the gentle corpse it was not needles or pins she made,
but a chain, each eye she pierced she found herself sliding
the next bone through, it formed a line to cut across the silage.
She left it there when she rose, intending to return home.

#181 Kevin Brophy 'Two weeks away'

#181 ‘Two weeks away’
We pack the car
consult the map
fill the tank
the water bottles
stack CDs
jubes and USBs
consult the map
make a booking
pack our clothes
books, camera, hats
consult the map
re-pack the car
make a list
re-pack the patient car
indifferent
and beautiful
watch local birds
do circles
sensing a departure

We leave
a twenty dollar note
on the kitchen table
for whoever
            breaks in

                        this time

#180 'Acclimatising'

#180 ‘Acclimatising’

Gradually infections take hold,
boils break out in mouths,
on hands, your throat hurts,
tiredness comes earlier each day,
unknown nurses say
they’ve seen it all before
(each one is out of here
on strict six-week rotation),
the youth worker’s taking
all the youth to Broome,
the vegetables are wilting,
and every thousand years or so
the desert settles a little more
confidently in,
gradually infections become the thing,
a cold won’t shift from your chest,
your throats is raw,
the crows are scattering the bins,
you have forgotten your umbrella,
the lessons of philosophers,
the rule of queens and kings,
and the brief lit hours given
between lengthening inconsolable nights
are given to inspecting new infections.


Julie McElhone #2 Plaint

Tiny against the mighty sky
How can we not worship the sun?
Nor I you?


Michele Morgan #174 grá iníon Máthair


























flowers for mothers
or, rather,
daughters left behind

Lisa Brockwell #30.2 QF1: Sydney to London

QF1:  Sydney to London


Acres and acres of unfenced time,
I can run through the meadow, jump the stream
of my mind. No tasks can be done, a picnic
day is declared.  But there’s a clear start
and an end – the journey will finish before
I stumble across any crumbling cliffs.

Lisa Brockwell #30 Last morning with project 366, in response to Kit Kelen’s Motley Man

The moon just a crescent on the wane,
the sun seeping the east with crimson,
I’m walking down the length of the front paddock
to retrieve the recycling bin. My son,
on his bike: Mum, there’s frost, I can feel the crunch!
The dawn just here and already so strong.

Efi Hatzimanolis #135 for all the PoExits (with thanks)


Water and air
air and water,
uncovered in me 
a hunger.

I saw an eagle pursue its prey,
a spotted neck turtle dove, straight 
into my elderly cat’s mouth.

I tell you this, to keep you here.
I write this, because I cannot leave.

The pigeon is not me.
Neither the eagle nor the cat 
could arrest that moment of truth
into the beauty I crave,
a deeper hunger than I thought possible.

Onto my shoulder,
I lift my cat, with the pigeon
clamped in her jaws.
The eagle never takes its eyes off its prey.
It sits immobile,
until we enter the house.
I wish to offer you, the eagle, the cat, the pigeon,
here, in this space.

Mikaela Castledine #182 Thank you and Goodnight (tongue in cheek for all the June poets)

I’m thinking of journeys and tasks
Sisyphus Christ the miller’s daughter
oh they are eternal
punishment for misdeeds
meant to instruct
Herculean you might say
one poem per day for one year
rolling each one uphill
twisting each one into existence
carrying the immense weight of them
it’s a capricious damnation

and then others come along
for a matter of weeks
no more
and look, I’m not...
but christ!
if Simon of Cyrene had said
phew! carrying that cross
for that little section was hard
I’m glad I did it
but I might have a little lie down now
Jesus would have nailed him a new one
thanks for your poems
it’s been lovely reading you
but ease up on the exhaustion
some of us have 184 more to write



Chrysogonus' Translation #95 - from Red Cone's "weekend"

akhir pekan

kata-kata tak terbatas
tersandung di sekeliling
mencari satu tempat
akan hangat dan keamanan

akhir pekan 

akhir pekan penuh luka
bagi teman jauh di sana
tangis jatuh saat ibu
tak mampu temukan putra
alasan dan penjelasan
apakah guna mereka lagi
saat saudara-saudari
dan kita meraba luka

aku terus melukis

weekend

endless words
tumble around
looking for a place
of warmth and safety

a weekend of pain
for friends elsewhere
tears as the mother
can't find her son
reasons and explanations
what use are they
when brothers and sisters
and all of us feel pain


I keep painting