your own planet

Dew

2010-12-09T17:58:00.000+10:00

overnight
the weather cooled
and all the grass was dewed
in the morning
the sun was shining
life renewed
and I won't cry over you

we only have
one moment
then the next
and then it's gone
and all we had
were years that passed
and tears to smother
the feelings
that couldn't last

we are all
we can change
the rest is a cage
we are all
we have to hold on to
the rest is chains

in the evening
stormclouds gathering
and soon the rain comes
to wash away
our rusted pain
burnt out by the sun
unloved by anyone.

Thin boy

2010-11-08T22:36:00.000+10:00

I have a thin boy
expanding
until he is overwhelming
I have a beautiful boy

I have a dream
in which we love each other
happy together
I have a beautiful dream

I have a gentle friend
we walk together
we're in clover
I have an imaginary friend

They say
you cannot wrap him up
you cannot bring him up
you have to give him up

They say
you cannot love enough
you cannot give enough
you have to live and learn

I have a thin boy
eats chips and vegemite
he is all right
I have him on my mind.

Three weeks ago

2010-11-08T21:35:00.000+10:00

Last week
I heard a man
crying in the night
sighing until daylight

what was the song he was singing
heard for a moment
then it was nothing.

A few months ago
I heard the voice of God
gently said my name
and turned over and went back to sleep
unclear
which of us was real
and which the dream.

Three weeks ago
I realised
there is no possibility
of happiness
when you are dead
but even then
you can still hope.

I wasn't here

2010-11-08T21:26:00.000+10:00

Ever since I discovered
that I don't exist
I have found it easier
to believe in fairy tales
such as
that there is a possibility
we can love each other

and even about that
I'm sceptical
because probably
we're just chemicals.

Ever since I discovered
that the earth is a void
I have found it easier
to believe it's worth
fighting with each other

because what would it matter
you get three score and ten
and then you are dust
everything you built
a pile of mould and rust.

You could let it go
let yourself be bathed
in the evening's soft sweet glow
watch the bats over Samford Road
give up everything
you've ever known

You could just let it flow
dissolve into particles
believing in miracles
watching your children grow.

Ever since I discovered
that I am destined to fail
I have started to want
you to build me a monumnet

and write upon it
that the world turned around
and he didn't care
it span around twenty-five thousand times
and he wasn't there.

Boundary Street

2010-07-16T08:50:00.000+10:00

I held your hand
in Boundary Street
and I knew
you would be mine
I felt like this is right
your hand in mine

I kissed you
your sharp teeth on my tongue
I felt like this is who we are
strangers in the twilight
we will learn together
to love and feel all right

I held you close
deep in a sweaty night
I felt like this is who we are
everything held inside

Let us run together
Your hand in my hand in yours
Let us be together
Alive with each other
Empty when we’re done

Let us be together
what harm can we do?
I will be who I am
You will be you

When we were young

2010-06-07T15:42:00.000+10:00

i touched your face
and you crumpled
like a tissue paper dolly
oh my golly
golly gosh
oh my gosh

when we were young
we wanted to live in
skyscrapers
be seen in newspapers
we would have motorbikes
if we did
what we were bid
by us when we were young

when i touched you
you opened up
you broke me up
i realised that lies
are better than flowers
and all hours with you
will be wasted hours

you know
you'd think
you'd think you'd think twice
before fucking with me
you know
you'd think
you'd think it through
before inviting me
to fuck with you
but you never do

if we had had a clue
we would never have done
all the things we do
if we had had a clue.

Awesome

2010-06-07T14:35:00.000+10:00

My god is greater than your god
yours wants us to comply
or else we die
mine just wants us to get by.

My god is greater than your god
yours wants blood
mine wants nothing for us
but good.

Your god is awesome
he made the trees, the stars, the sky
the earth and everything
that crawls upon it
but it crawls
bowed down by awe.

Your god is awesome
jealous and vengeful
demanding and cruel
compared with him
mine is so small.

My god is tiny
living inside me
a god of forgotten places
corners and traces.

My god is tiny
you cannot find him
aren't even searching
as though you are blinded

we all need reminding
there's awesome inside us
from time to time
we all need to find it.

sorrow

2010-04-29T09:26:00.001+10:00

in the bud
so long, you wither
are you even
a flower any more?

come on sugar
water me
set me free
I will never die
if you love me

come on honey
flow over me
let me be

I don't know any other song to sing
but sorrow has a hold of me
I don't know any other world to live in
but I know there's ecstasy

come on sugar
be the sun for me
winter's long and cruel
I know that spring can be

I hope there's spring for me

Poor

2010-04-27T16:43:00.003+10:00

I earnt my poverty
without knowing I was
doing work that would bring it
and now I swim
in a cold, deep sea

I earnt a poverty
so deep and cruel
that I cannot find
any comfort
and want to drown
but cannot
force my arms
to surrender

I am nothing
I know it
why would anyone
want to love me?
I have nothing
to offer
but the howls of
a child
lost lonely and cold

I am nothing
I know it
and inside me
a small unstillable
voice
is crying out
for her
to enrich me

but no one hears.

Let me love you

2010-02-23T17:26:00.003+10:00

Let me love you

My voice is tiny
but I sing
frail songs of love I lost
of all the ways
I loved you
since our paths have crossed

Let me love you

My heart is huge
kettle drum beats
come close
until you can
feel it pound
the syllables of your name

Let me love you
as I have loved you
Let me be with you
when you are with me
in the ways and places
we are with each other
who we are
and none else.

Epiphanies of love

2010-02-09T14:01:00.003+10:00

sometimes
we have epiphanies of love
an understanding that
we do not have to
hate or fear each other

it does not last
and we sink
back into the sucking mire
that we are calling
home
because we never feel at home
with one another

sometimes
I see sunlight on your face
a smile
that I have never seen you
smile before
and I realise
I have never known you at all.

tiny

2009-10-26T17:25:00.002+10:00

If I make myself
tiny
no one can find me
reach inside my life
and hurt me

If I make myself
small
curled up
into a spineless ball
no one will know
I'm here at all.

I wish I could touch the skin of you

2009-09-06T15:29:00.003+10:00

I wish I could touch the skin of you
and allow the goodness I hold within
to flow through my fingertips into you
and that would be enough

I wish I could turn the key
that winds the clock
that ticks down the hours
and years between us
and make it stop

I wish I could sing my name
into the deepest part of you
the secret heart of all of you
and touch you
where no one knows you even are
but me
and that would be our love.

Secretive

2009-05-07T16:17:00.003+10:00

you know what?
I don't have secrets
how could I?
I don't ever go outside
except that i sometimes drive the kids
somewhere or other
but we don't do anything secretive
just
whatever the park, school

When my mum
phones me
she says what's new?
and I say, nothing
and she doesn't ring me often

Sometimes I try to talk to you
about you know
philosophy or whatever
but I always pick inappropriate times
like
Desperate Housewives is on

Bothered

2009-05-07T11:00:00.001+10:00

you know what?
I am someone who when he has something on his mind, I can't let it rest
it's not impatience
it's that things bother me
I am never intentionally cruel to people
If I know they need something, I try to give them it
I know it might not seem that way, but that's actually what I'm doing
And it seems so natural to me that that is what you should do, I don't even know how a person can do otherwise
I don't know how you can ignore the urge to do the right thing
when you know what it is

Inert

2009-02-19T21:27:00.000+10:00

sssh don't say a thing
you have to trust
that when I take you by the hand
I'll lead you somewhere good

you have to trust
because I've never proved a thing

I opened up my arms
and let you in
so don't go

when something is good
but it goes unrewarded
do you feel sad that it does not have what it merits
or glad that you know?

because we separate
like ripples on a blank shore

I realise I
do not know a thing
because I ain't got that swing
I realise I
do not know how to
make anything

I cannot lift my hands to pray
tied down with a million tons of lead
I cannot lift my voice to say
that if we do not speak
we're dead

inert
and fooled by
lights that were hung to distract us
from all the ones who loved us
from all the ones we were

inert
and dead inside
wrapped ourselves in sorrow
when first we lied

sssh don't say a thing
you have to trust
that when I take you by the hand
I'll lead you nowhere at all

I have never been
anywhere at all

all the time

2009-02-15T15:36:00.003+10:00

all the time
I wish for wings
and labour
under the weight of expectations
no one holds for me
but me

all the time
i wish for love
to carry me away
but how can it find me?
labouring under tons
suffocating

Tomorrow I will do better
I promise
I will become the man
I always wanted you to be
Tomorrow I will do better
Don't make me try today

I am drowning in tomorrows
wishing my life away
Tomorrow will be never
so long as it's never today

all the time
I wish for kisses
as the kissable me
grows smaller and smaller
till there's none left to be

all the time
I wish for wishes
and the wishable me
is all wished to nothing
nothing left of me

as good as me

2008-04-03T20:08:00.003+10:00

your revenge is to hurt me
the way you imagine
you have been hurt

and if you were bigger
your revenge would be
to show me how love is
how you believe it should be

but you are not bigger
and if you were
we would not be having
revenge

your love is a small thing
withered and taciturn
you think that is worth fighting for
but anyone
who wanted it
would not have
the balls to fight
at all.

hey, i am the epitome
of the rough and the smooth
(although, frankly,
the smooth is winning
by a clear mile
and you know it too
it must be hard to maintain
the rage
in the knowledge that
what you have
is not all that bad)
but i have a good heart
you know
there aren't many around

you think that everyone
is good
but me

but i am the only
good thing i see.
You just won't ever
find as good as me,
as bad as that is
as good as can be.

Glider

2008-04-03T17:16:00.003+10:00

do you ever think
you are swimming on top of a deep ocean
and all you need to do is close your eyes,
let go
and sink?

do you ever feel
that while you were sleeping
you were emplanted
a tree in silt
and the silt slowly hardens
until you're in concrete
and no longer move?

do i know you
do we know each other
when we cannot touch
or be together?
not distance or time
or any small difference
but the bars on our cages
hold us apart.

have you ever known
anyone beautiful
who could somehow touch you
see sometimes right through you
moving beside you?

do you ever think
you are flying
soaring
high up on an autumn day
on the last warm draught
of our coolest year?
do you ever feel
you are floating
and all you need do
is breathe?

Fig

2008-03-13T20:33:00.000+10:00

in a fig
a wasp lays an egg
just to die
just to live and die
a wasp in a fig is a stone in the tear in your eye

in a fig
a wasp lays its life down
a wasp has its lifetime
other wasps that eat you
make you
a wasp like they are
eating other wasps

if we fly
from fig to fig
if the world is too big
it is how big?
if we fly
from life to life
if life is too much
how much is our life?

I am kissing you now
because tomorrow is not written
it will come unbidden
but let it come
we will not be hidden

I am kissing you now
because we do not have forever
I never
think before I kiss
I think about what I might miss

I think about figs
rotting without wasps
to have lives to lose inside the figs
that give them lives to live inside
stones in the tears that never leave our eyes.

what is

2008-03-13T20:27:00.000+10:00

what loves you
if I am nothing but a whisper in the wind
what cannot live if you are crying

what dies for you
if I die for you
what lives for you
to see you beautiful and free

what loves you
if I am nothing but the sunlight in my eyes
what cannot live if you are dying

who cries for you
for all the things that can go wrong for you
who lies and cheats
if someone has to lie and cheat for you

what loves you
if I am not here to love you
what loves you
but the cells of me
that cannot unlove you

Our own planet

2008-02-26T15:32:00.000+10:00

hey baby
one day
when the world is crazy
we’ll float away
to a place
where no one can bring us down
never grind us down
our own planet
where we are king and queen
of our own dreams

i have no demands
and i won’t surprise you
you cannot enslave me
but i won’t lie to you

i like singing in the car
watch the fields that pass us by
in them worlds are won and lost
baked into the daily crust
i like singing in the bath
watch the water flushed away
in it floats the world we made
once we loved and then was past

echoes of stones

2008-02-16T09:49:00.001+10:00

do you ever wish
you could reach out and touch someone
lay your fingers on their face
as if to say
i know you are alone in there
i feel the same?

do you ever feel a chasm
a prison?
i do.

but what am i
echoes of stones
thrown down a well
unreal
still i feel.

do you ever feel you are spinning
slowly
your own planet
lost in a universe
just above zero
never a home?

i can hear a river
slow and steady
i do not know
which sea it fills

i can hear rain
creating our oceans
i do not know
which drop is me.

kippers

2007-02-16T09:53:00.001+10:00

couldn’t make a dream
from fishing line
and inbetweens

broken and unindulged
an overstuffed sofa
fell apart at the seams

I was trying to tell you
what’s good for you is good for me
you couldn’t see
or you saw what you couldn’t believe

still I reeled you in
slippery and untouchable
I felt the ghost of you
with my fingers
and kissed you in my dreams

no one ever is
what they seem
except for me
I’m unbridled and free
no one ever is
what they claim
except their name
and the size of their chains
no one ever is
what you dream
unless you dream
I will set you free

This though

2007-02-16T09:53:00.000+10:00

This though, son, I will tell you
You won’t be better than me
You won’t be worse than me
You’ll be the same
That’s genetics and a sense of inevitability

And many people will tell you
There’s a scheme that explains all this
They’re entirely sure of it
And you will wonder
how they can be
when you’re not sure of anything

Well, whatever gets you through
at the smallest possible cost
Counting what you’ve gained
ignoring what you’ve lost
is the path you should take
anything else
is going to be a painful mistake

This though, son, I will tell you
No one will love you better than me
I love you infinitely
Entirely indivisibly
That’s genetics and a sense of impossibility.

Lamorna beach

2006-02-16T10:17:00.001+10:00

In my dream, the wind was in your hair.
We never had harsh words.
There was nothing to forgive.

In my dream, we have the sand between our toes.
And you know that the sea would drown you if you let it.
But I am not pushing you in, dragging you down, holding you back.
Or doing anything.

But I have a good heart.
Confused in the melee.
Sometimes. Easily broken.

I am always talking, talking.
Saying nothing, meaning nothing.
I just want the hours to pass.
Until you kiss me.
Once again. Just dreaming.
Nothing to fear. We are ever further apart.
never coming near.

I have kissed my son

2006-02-16T09:50:00.000+10:00

I have kissed my son
a thousand times
and held him close
And will kiss his face
one million more
before he goes

before the days that words can’t bridge
before the distance grows

I will kiss his face
a million times
before he ups and goes.

Will you love me, Billy, oh my son
Will you love me, Billy boy?
When we are lost and cannot find our bond
Will I still bring you joy?

I have watched my son
sleep in his bed
I see his life before us.

untitled

2005-02-16T09:54:00.000+10:00

A shell within a shell within a shell
if you find him on a lonely beach
do not tell
anyone
that you found a shell within a shell within a shell
If you peel him
hoping to reveal him
uncovering a pearl
Will you feel him
trying to conceal him
with another whorl?
A boy within a boy within a man
if you found him in your plans
do not tell
anyone
that you found a boy within the boy within the man,
they will not understand.

If you hurt him
grind him up
desert him
he will curl and cry
If you hold him
snatch him up
and love him
he will fade and die.

A question mark curled within the word
if you answered
you ask, has he heard
but questions are shells like chalk and grit
he left without a word.

B., R. & C.

2005-02-16T09:47:00.000+10:00

I am lamenting them before they have lived
The black sash, the slow walk, the downcast eyes.

I am bringing them gold.
Laughter.
And plastic things.
I am calling it the life they will lead.

I am telling you about my soul
I don't have language
I am telling you about an empty vessel

I am telling you about hopes, dreams
and nothing substantial
I am telling you about having and holding.

I am lamenting them before they have lived
I do not know how to free them

I am lamenting them before they have lived
I do not know how to be with them.

Across the beach

2003-02-16T09:45:00.000+10:00

Across the beach
the remains of a lost boat
scattered pieces of wood

Feet in the tar
a slow walk home
I wonder
how will I scrape it

There are slates
in the road
by our house

and the sound of sea
never ceasing

waking
the wind has dropped
a bird is walking
across the roof

Waiting room

1997-02-16T10:28:00.000+10:00

I dream of moving
into the cold
empty blue sky

I have feathers on me
freezing on my skin
I have dreams to live out
waiting to begin

I dream of sailing
into the night
black starlit sky

I have lead inside
the veins of my beating heart
a cold and hungry beast
tears itself apart

in the desert
the tearless trackless waste
all you do
is wait.

Afraid of drowning

1997-02-16T10:27:00.001+10:00

Hold your head up
You have nothing to fear
I hear what you’re saying
But the water’s coming over me

We could put away
the foolish empty dreams of youth
we could hide away
what we know to be the truth
But we couldn’t change
the rushing passage of time
the feeling of helplessness
as we go beyond our depth

Make your mind up
You haven’t got all day
I know what you mean by that
But it all slips away

I can hide away my pain
paint myself a picture of a desirable life
But I can’t calm the rising tide
the whole world flowing by

My feet are on sand
I cry and no one hearing me
believe I am happily
in the shallows
swimming on my own

No comment

1997-02-16T10:27:00.000+10:00

I’m not making this up you know
it really happens
and in my life it’s true
fact really is
more banal than fiction

I watch a million people pass by
they all have stories
dreams and mysteries
they all hope to achieve
fucking boring

I never tell the truth to strangers
they only trade in lies
no question marks or grey areas
nothing that
cannot be realised

I’m not making my move just yet
until I know where I’m at
or even where I’m going
everyone who passes is running
only I am staying

I’m not making this up you know
you can see it all around you
some are feeling ecstasy
and some in pain
they all want something new.

Ouagadougou

1997-02-16T10:26:00.000+10:00

When I was a boy
I could draw a map of my world
What it was then and what it could be
A world without chains noble and free

And like a river
the slowmoving currents of my heart
flowed in a dream from here to eternity
no limits on what any man could be

what will hold you down
what will drown you
are the words that tie you to the ground
that cover your eyes and blind you

and the world, as it slumbers it burns
as it turns it burns itself to ash
and the whole world afraid of itself
aches to be under the lash

They close all the doors
pull down and bolt the shutters
cast out the friends once we made
forget we were brothers

and the world, as it burns it dies
as it lies it chokes on its words
and the whole world consuming itself
until there is nothing left

I will not close my doors
to all the things I once held dear
I will still believe the world is free
and in what it is and can still be.

Slender

1996-02-16T10:26:00.000+10:00

If you wait till dawn
The world will move inside you
Planets slide around you
the night will slip away

It’s crazy but the moon is tender
Crazy when the moon is full
It’s hard and our chances are slender
Hard to live through it all

If the sky clears you will see me
My arms stretched out in a cross
Counting gains and what I’ve lost
Like sand life slips away

Song

1996-02-16T10:25:00.002+10:00

This life is a life of sorrows
my heart it breaks with pain
The one I love has left me
she won’t be back again

How sweet the kiss my lover gives
How tender her caress
How cursed and low this poor man
who one bright day was blessed

Oh love you do forsake me
to leave me here alone
inside my house of tears
deep in a world of stone.

How could you hurt me

1996-02-16T10:25:00.001+10:00

how could you ever leave me when
no one knows how to love you but me
how could you ever feel you were free

and if you think it’s ok to cry, I’ll cry
I’ll weep the mountain down
but hushed up never to make a sound
if you think I should die, I’ll die.

how could you ever hurt me when
I never knew how to hurt you
and took the flowers of every moment I had
and tied them up in love for you.

and if you thought I would ever leave you
I will still be there in your sigh
and as long as there are stars and the moon to see by
I shall never die.

Stradbroke afternoon

1996-02-16T10:25:00.000+10:00

Dolphin finding
the perfect rainbow wave
to surf and fall and kiss
in the molten gold
of Stradbroke after noon

Cocky gulls
marking out the beach
They know that man
can never own what’s good
It comes on a short lease.

And in the evening hiss
kookaburra on a wire
The stars above his head
waiting for a feed.

False face

1996-02-16T10:24:00.001+10:00

cold heart
ulgy eyes
false face
to hide behind

So long you were a word
or a photograph
You once were a joke
someone laughed

old heart
Deep as a mine
worked out
running through time

It wont go away
It wont change
It wont move
It stays the same

You could laugh it off
Put it from your mind
a new false face
to hide behind.

My heart has flown

1996-02-16T10:24:00.000+10:00

Baby
if the stars were crazy
And I wasn’t feeling lazy
maybe
you could build a bridge with words
If you wanted to be heard

Ladies
well they come & go
Never to be known

Baby
I was born to be alone
Because my heart has flown
maybe
Begin our lives without me
In my dreams I’m still free

Ladies
you have never ever hurt me
In my heart I’m still free.

Distance is time

1996-02-16T10:23:00.000+10:00

Driven by the wind
the empty sea
Solitary in a desert
there is nothing to seek

In the darkest night
a planet passes by
a cloud drifts across
the bluest sky

No form no sensation
No word or rhyme
No relation just people
with no time

It would be like a dream
It would be a mystery
It would be like a tale to tell
The deepest sea

It would be a memory
Completely forgotten
An empty dark core
Filthy rotten

Everything falls
according to its plan
every woman child
every man
Everything falls
collapsing inside
Losing all heart
Everything dies.

Shadows on the wall

1995-02-16T10:22:00.000+10:00

A woman crying
a baby with no mother
You fall down
We walk no further
A few cold stones
Arbeit macht frei
You haven't come here to think
You've come here to die
A cough in another room
A shell is landing
a hungry child
no understanding
Battered twisted
deprived of liberty
animals
caged and ugly

There is green grass
rivers and trees
flowers dip their heads
gently in the breeze
And in the night
the calls of owls,
Alone
A wolf howls.

Nothing no longer

1995-02-16T10:21:00.000+10:00

Leaves are coming down
a car goes by
I am the last swallow summer left
a cloud in the sky

In the street outside
someone is singing
a car is burning
someone has died.

I wish I could have told you
I wish I had known
If wishes were wings
I would have flown

You have chained me
enslaved me
I became what you made me
You had no claim on me

Leaves are falling down
pile up on rainsoaked ground
There isn't a sound
There isn't a sound

Nothing holds me down

1994-02-16T10:20:00.000+10:00

you wake in a rosey pink dawn
been sleeping in a haze
found all your thoughts in all directions
you were otherwise engaged

you slept on a cloud
in a million degrees of light
in a dream of aching years
curled up tight

I held you in my arms
and me and mine
I drank to you with laughter
I drank to you with wine

Anyone who had the soul to see
beyond the things that cannot be
Anyone who ever wonders
Anyone who's floating free.

Nothing restrains us
Nothing can hold us down
Above our heads are stars
beneath our feet the ground

Nothing contains me
No chains or bounds
I was looking for a life to dream
but there's living all around

You sleep on a sea of silver
bathing in a dream
find wings of hope and love
beautiful and clean

Anyone who outwalks the shade
left behind them by the sun
Anyone who has anything
to give to anyone.

Must only tiptoe

1994-02-16T10:19:00.000+10:00

The first raindrops on your head awake you
and shivering in the cold ache of another lonely daybreak
You hope to get through.
And knowing that there will be nothing special
nothing fresh and nothing new - you've seen drops of rain before -
You have to just get through.

There isn't anything to want
or even think about, not any more
There isn't any way to show or tell
the ones you wish knew, what was it
you wanted them to know about you?

If there should come a time when
you want someone to hold the umbrella
over your head, their arms folded about you
how will you know or recognise them
when all have coats of hardened rainbow - metal -
you will never see through.

Must only tiptoe when we are walking through
the times and places where we have placed our markers
but if we never let ourselves go - never run -
how will we then ever get any place
we wish to be -
how will we ever learn how to set ourselves free.

The last snows of a bitter winter ebbing away
all the ground is soft and marshy - you cannot move -
you cannot pick your feet up - can only feel
the arctic lonely wind of what you know to be true -
blows right through you.

For every blessing a curse

1994-02-16T10:18:00.000+10:00

when I drank sugar, when I drank it,
it rotted my bones and made them into tar
and changed my head so that
I wanted to get better
But I felt worse by far

But sugar is sweet to calm the urging heart
to make you forget that before things improve
they inevitably get worse
and if every cloud has a silver lining
for every blessing there’s a curse

when I took your heart
and modelled it out of plasticine
I made all the valves from clockwork
so it would run just the way I wanted and
we could live within a dream

But I’m not dreaming not anymore
because they tell you and you know it’s true
if anyone’s blessed then you are blessed
but if anyone’s cursed
it’s you

And I will sing my secrets into a rock and
bury them in the sea
And curse the fate that has pulled the tide out
left me stranded and if anyone’s cursed
it’s me

Sure

1993-02-16T10:52:00.000+10:00

if i could be sure of you
time would not matter
if i knew what to say and do

If I could have a clue
the world would spin faster
If I could be sure of you

If I knew what you know
could see the places that you go
If I knew which way
the wind will blow

If I could just once see through
to what in all of this is true
If I knew how I could be
sure of you

1993

Passing season

1993-02-16T10:51:00.002+10:00

can you hear the sea?
washing through my shallow veins
breaks my rocky heart
you surf on my crashing waves

how could I forget you
you left footprints in the sand
deep down in my soul
you walked through that foreign land

can you see my country?
waves on rocks and shooting stars
where every day will flash past
you drive through in a fast car

how could I forget you?
and take a brush to erase
the memory of once good love
you want to wipe without a trace

but I will disappear
into the night of broken dreams
leaving kisses tears and my love
a trail of old brown autumn leaves

untitled

1993-02-16T10:51:00.001+10:00

sometimes I feel you are only inches from me
and if I turned and looked
you'd be all I saw before me
sometimes I'm feeling ugly

some days the world turns so slowly
and you wonder if hours are years
some others they fly right by me
sometimes I'm feeling lonely

sometimes I feel I need someone beside me
I feel I need a helping hand
sometimes when I'm crying quietly
there is no-one to hold me.

Stay at home

1993-02-16T10:51:00.000+10:00

In a glass - I saw
everything I fear
come to pass

you could have known
should have foretold
some of the places you least want to go
turn out to be home

I know - we have to part
it has to happen
you cannot have a heart

I should never have
let it happen
this way
I reach out for a place
I could never stay

you'll have to be alone
stay at home - never roam
you'll have to pay
for every trip
to every place you've gone

this is the way
of every part of human living
when what you get
is not worth the price
of what you're giving

you never learn - you burn
your itching feet
back to where you began
return

you stay at home now
never stray far
should stay at home now
never go far.

Nothing can be

1993-02-16T10:50:00.001+10:00

I cannot move
and when I move
my eyes are closed
I cannot see a thing

only rocks to break you
only sticks
and stones to shake you up
Only love to make you cry

I cannot feel
and when I feel
my eyes are open
and I see everything

She was a bough
to break my head on
a secret
a lie to tell
She was a whisper
a fading dream
a kiss
a wishing well

I cannot be
and when I am
my heart is cold
I am not anything.

On a rock

1993-02-16T10:50:00.000+10:00

here is something they say
to dull the senses, kill the pain
but I would go blind rather
than never see your face again

I got a big red motorbike
in my dreams it's an aeroplane
I would fly on wheels of sadness
down some lonely country lane

There is a big and empty room
where they place the broken hearts
where they lock the lost and foolish
all those broken into parts

here is something they say
to help you leave your love behind
but life is not that easy
you're out of sight not out of mind

here is something they say
to dull the senses, kill the pain
but can't quite kill the urge to
have you in my heart again.

The story of my life

1993-02-16T10:49:00.002+10:00

this is the story of my life
I was born
that I'm sure of
for I am here

then there was a confused period
of some 26 years
full of sorrow
joy and anger

now I have met you
there will be another
26 years or so
of sorrow joy
and anger

then I'll most likely die.

Lonesome without you

1993-02-16T10:49:00.001+10:00

this evening the sun
like a track
of a golden glistening tear
is falling down
around the envious dirty world

and the cold slate evening sky
shatters hearts hard as rock
into pieces of dreams
of forgotten moments
brings in the empty night once more

nothing glows and nothing shines
even the stars lack their lustre
without you to shine beside them
light them
I need you to ignite them

and the pale and insolent moon
dark in its bed of diamonds
is whispering your name
reminding me that
all the wishes that I wish
would wish you mine again

Notes for terminate and stay resident

1993-02-16T10:49:00.000+10:00

elephants never forget
but I forget
your name your face
and everything about you

Nothing can remain
when you take these things away
love dignity pride
leave me only shame

Some say all tends to order
Some all to chaos goes
What's left when it all falls apart
no one knows

nothing ever forgotten
something you cannot grasp
even when my mind is empty
something small will last.

Empty

1993-02-16T10:48:00.001+10:00

children on a lawn
a river,
nothing moving but
the sun is moving
slowly across the sky.

later
I thought I heard
you say something
but it was nothing
just a passing word
someone else said
and I heard.

I wanted to believe
that in time all our blemishes are healed
and we turn out to be
actual human beings
real and free.

I wanted to believe
in the supreme indefatigability of love
of all dreams come true
of me and another you.

Children in a storm
running through streets
paved not with gold
but knee-high in slush and sleet,
empty like a dream.

Feathers

1993-02-16T10:48:00.000+10:00

The feathers of light
the blue sky
the unending note
the bell never ends
its ringing

The sweeping brush
I paint
everything I see
frigid empty
transparency

The feathers of the night
deep and lonely
stars
children never end
their singing

The first touch
I feel
of anything real
wonderful love
clarity

Boiling & freezing

1993-02-16T10:47:00.001+10:00

I felt you creep
like a moving sickness
vectored across my skin

everything
is blowing hot and cold
getting older
there won't be time left
to think about
time wasted
thinking about you

I saw you waiting
down a million
empty corridors of life
thinking
of things to say
at the end
of anything left to say

I won't feel for you
when you're gone
subtly try to
call you back
I won't wait around
in a limbo of hope
ugly fear
I won't be dismayed

everything
collapses with time
ending up heatless
getting older
colder than misery
lost and alone

I felt you gripping me
and now you slip away
all across my empty life
nothing left to say

Going to Australia

1993-02-16T10:47:00.000+10:00

wail and weep
creep

creep into my arms
unravel all
your splendid charms

I know a word.
I know a joke about
how all I had
spilled about
I know a good joke.

we're like sheep
bound into life
by a million words
commitments & promises
we can't let go,

and what we truly feel
we cannot let it show.

wail and weep, creep,
your motherfucking heart is weak.

But I know
that when once you look
into the depths
of where you want to be
you will see,

you will still want me.

When I went to where I went to

1993-02-16T10:46:00.001+10:00

There was a shadow of a time
before I was a shadow of the man I am today,
before I fell in love with the whole idea
of someone, anyone, falling in love with me,
when I knew, or at least was sure,
that real was real and unreal should be hid away
now I know I was at a kind of place
some how I should have stayed.

But whispering in the wind,
the times that are waiting, holding all possibility
calling to me, saying nothing but
promising everything
promise deliverance, will take me to where I,
not now, but will soon want to be.

Anna bella

1990-02-16T10:12:00.000+11:00

she whispers like water
over the rocks of he dreams
that are scattered
a change in the weather
and like a river
she is flowing
opening up like a flower.

What secrets do you have?
I wanna know.
What worlds do you live in?
I really wanna know.
where will we go
when everywhere we've been
is dancing around us
a carnival of ghosts
hopeless and lonely
I wanna know you
and I want you to know me.

a terminal ballet
we move in flounces
gestures
talking but
saying nothing
saying nothing
but still talking.

Electron beam

1990-02-16T09:56:00.000+11:00

waking in a world where a million rays float by
the sun is in my eyes
I watch it spinning turning wheeling
everything flows
everything flashes by.

dancing on the razor wire of life
nothing as real as it seems
you see the dream
I see the dream that
lies behind the dream

you know you have wings
you know you can swim
you know that the world never ends
it can never begin

you know nothing
that doesn't have a name
everything that changes
ultimately stays the same.

living in a world where a million worlds collide
this is a world of stars
suffering in a sun of silence
nothing moves
planets passing by

Virtual particles

1990-02-16T09:55:00.000+11:00

you and I
have been friends
since before
the beginning of time
yet
we do not know each other.
we walk beneath
the stars of dancing symmetry
and all we perceive
the waves upon the sea.
we have come far
to remain the same
to hold onto what
must change,
we must come and go thus
each our wandering sun
never cold
never warm
never to move at all.

C'MON BABY

1990-02-16T09:45:00.000+11:00

Like cats their claws dirty as night's only as
dirty as you want it to be
choke me
c'mon angel wrap your head around me
I can see thru your eyes how stupid I look
That any word is good enough so long as it's not love and if I pray
I'll say a little prayer for you.

Choose a sentiment I've got plenty I'm a
sentimental guy
kill me
hang me up on spikes
c'mon angel trip the lights
for me
Put me up on wires
c'mon angel do it for me
Lift me up
Higher & higher & higher
I go as high as I go and when I do
I'll say a little curse on you.

A man in your bed

1988-02-16T09:44:00.000+10:00

Theres a knife in your back — rusting like
the love is gone sour — Theres no way to
go back —
Theres no fear of attack
Only fear of the sweating fear
Theres nobody here — No one I know
Theres a knife in your back — No one took
your place — No one holding your hand
Theres nothing to understand.

The lights are dimming —
they're out —
No more coins for the meter.
Tonight the cars are all stopped
Tonight the whsipers are stilled,
Theres a knife in your back
One step and youre killed —

No longer you're killed,

Riot of colour

1986-02-16T09:54:00.000+10:00

Ugly as sin
And sin is beautiful,
Like a little igrl
In a pink dress,
You know what she'll grow to be
A big girl just like me.

No rose-coloured glasses
But I still can't see
If I was a colour
Which would it be?

You're turning on the clocks
Just to measure
How much time
We could have together,
I fear
you'll live in me forever.

girls,
your skin's so fragile
and will get old
Burning now
But every fire grows cold
even stars burn to shells
You're hotter than a thousand hells

girls,
I'll remember
what you look like
I'll set it down on paper
In a riot of colour
and remember you at your best,

A little girl
In a lovely pink dress.