C is for Close

(vb) to stop or obstruct entrances, apertures, gaps;
to refuse access to or passage across; to bring together
the parts of; join; unite
(Stock Exchange) to be worth at the end of a trading period
(adj) shut; shut tight; not open; enclosed; confined, narrow;
lacking fresh or freely circulating air; practising secrecy, 
reticent; near, together in space, time or relation; not deviating 
from a model or original
(n) the end or conclusion; a cul-de-sac

Prelude: "All these earthquakes,
disasters: is it really end days?"

On Location: For some
those end days have
already come.

Whole cities staggering
like drunks, rusted war machines
like giant chunks of sculpture
you wish it was
it isn't, it's an aftermath
these wars are biblical
in proportion, all out of
proportion. Is anyone, ever,
going to stop the action, ask:
hey guys, what are we doing
this dirty work for?

Other Questions:
How many people occupy
The Underground?
How many are buried alive?
If you teach a six-year-old
to shoot and hate, is it
your intention he kill
his mother, his humanity?

"As a woman I have no country."
Virginia Woolf

There's no country where
home is holy, unquestioned, as is prison
the sight of a woman sickens
guns are turned casually like a camera
your shoes can make too much noise
and you are beaten
the men are highly-strung, hysterical,
cold, closed, wild and crazed
there are no doctors on the streets
to cure them

Women
have no country
no place
no home
It's worse than that

Women are traded
across borders
as commodity
It's worse than that

Women don't exist
because girls
are aborted
It's worse than that

Women have no place
when what you say
must be whispered underground
you wear clothes to hide identity
in the streets where the dead lie
and your throat is closed
against terror's blade.

After the Event
A lovely large darkness.
Driving home one hundred
kilometres, fast, a woman
alone. Driving between
walls of healthy trees, tall
and glorious, painted
on the black sky. Beyond,
pastures I know to be green
by day. I face the night
without fear

remember Wajia the refugee
returning to Kabul, hopeful
in the mini bus, and the view
we all get of pristine white
mountains, a low crumble
of clay, a desert. "But,"
she cries, "Where are the trees?
This parkland was full
of trees, beautiful flowers."

She returns to Pakistan
to the camp where young children
push over mud walls of
unoccupied houses.

I'm driving and listening
to new Polish Jewish music
modern, youthful, discordant
exuberant. The long-limbed
trees usher me home.

Off the Cuff 14: On Revisiting Waiheke Island & A lifetime in & out of love for Melbourne Ch 2

APAD 14   prompt: "___________ Island"

On Revisiting Waiheke Island

At Onetangi, the shade is black
the shade as deep as sleep, the tree
I'm under makes deep and cool
black shade, the table and seat
an old tree smooth-edged, worn,
chiselled by restless teen hands
or men debating another drink
another woman / a different trouble.

Before I am caught by sleep
I leave the shade, retreat
to the beach-front cafe, and sweat.
Waves shove at island's pale rim
gather for half-hearted dumps
sparkling and glittering yet
speak of repetition rather than
of being wet, refreshing.

Six young men play football
take a second for distraction
as four minimally wrapped
young women - beers grasped
by the necks - saunter toward
the water, neither restless
nor soothing, yet  something
to aim for, somewhere to go.

Where I am, energy arises from
inexplicable laughter, the clatter
of trays, car doors slamming,
a startle of crockery being stacked.
I sit for an hour to see what changes
to sink into leather, to drink
Weeping Sands red, to wonder
about the islands like cardboard

beyond where the ocean makes
a dark blue line, ruling off a page.
I imagine the Pacific shrugging
and squirming, setting off tsunami.
Arrival of the island's bus reawakens
interest, but Oneroa by four pm is
deserted, shut down. I am ferried -
exhausted -  back to Auckland.


A Lifetime of being in and out of love for Melbourne

Chapter 2: 1965 - 74

Parkville, Clayton: places
of learning, yearning.
On the footy field, He
appears beside her; hormones
flood body, brain; they tryst
on homebound train. He alights
at Alphington so she loves
that name. No ideas of global
travel yet, all journeys
on the same rail and tram tracks.

Preston, Rosanna, Upwey -
Clayton, North Caulfield - Prahran
East Malvern - each suburb a superb
setting, and song, plenty of dramatic
tension there: in summer, glaring
pavements make eyes water;
trees and birds make well-controlled
appearances; the house in Christine Street
is the first in a new estate, a long walk
to the railway; leafier older places

smell of rancid cooking oil,
generations of slaving by women
you do the best you can to furnish
and decorate secondhand.
Across a party lounge, eyes lock.
They live together, marry
(Oh, the wantonness, the nonchalance:
six in a VW beetle, three pavlovas
for the wedding on knees, cigarettes
held carefully and high, windows open).

It's Cheltenham and Burwood for aunts
Rye for the grandmother, Syndal, Caulfield,
Malvern, Clematis for friends.
Kingsbury and Burwood Heights provide
work and colleagues. Holidays interstate
and out to country towns please.
But they part after she climbs a high peak
senses the secrets of long-distance views.
Now the urge to join a diaspora, to act
and live globally, becomes a driving need.


NaPoWriMo 14