#poetwee

[wordsbeforebirds]

srsly, tho?

why not? there’s time I mean perhaps there’s time? let’s try twice I’ll try text tell u times at least twice we’ve got the time there’s something sound in sense significance ten times in and, smoothly in, there’s time I mean of course, there’s not the time so try why not take time a moment or as many as u like why not it's worth the risk and wearing on there’s only time and talents and together times twice or four or something simpler why not try there’s only now and later and deciding not or onward maybe more and whether it was worth it twice or twenty times (why not?) I’ll try words in circles tempting tumbling out twice again why not? and testing space between themselves between us and between the words the text the symbols why not try? there’s not the time or, is there?  seven seconds ticked tucked lucked out or out of luck there’s time enough and space and yesterday and time to think of it and shape the way the words move in surrounding time encircling thoughts in circles out of time enough why not enough to shape to craft to make become one thought the time, I mean, become the time why not? there’s time I’ll text u twice or seven times the grating motor groaning slow to creep settle still or not or sleep cornering, like words wound well around your index or your smallest finger pieces smooth like pulp like paper crushed and burned and made anew again, there’s time there’s counting time the times there was and wasn’t time and what the fuck? there's not the fucking time.

[wordsbeforebirds]

australia

don’t record this alone, echoing or whatever in a dark room, or in something that may sound like that when it’s played on radio don’t read this like its epic.

it’s already lost or something or dead it's not critical: this is not what matters.

driving--let's face it--is mostly about getting to That Place You’re Going. Moving Forwards beyond it beyond That Other Place. is it ironic to suppose it’s passed? past? is it postmodern? the road I mean is the road postmodern?

it's grotesque

epic

I’ll not romanticise the country.

I’ll not romanticise the country, or the suburbs or This Country this is not what matters.

I don’t care

I’ll not romanticise the way the waves lap leave salt in stinging lips, thick hair or those few times tumbling terrified then blinking at the sun, like bleach creeping in, then growing dull bare feet on burning asphalt whatever it’s just the fucking beach leave it behind

what point is nostalgia? it’s not what matters. I’ve not the time for it, like being in a hurry like old people and regret I’ve not the time for it it’s not what matters.

I’ll not romanticise that bird in flight. sure, it’s strange, straight straight along a straight road there’s a metaphor in it the road, I mean there’s a metaphor in the road. something postmodern in the road intersecting the landscape and in the bird traversing it the landscape traversing the landscape by means of the road the bird using slipstreams, or whatever word relates to the physics of it:

it’s boring

this kind of meaning. and

post colonialism!

whatever.

there’s meaning in it, but what does that even mean? it's grotesque it isn’t action you're not doing anything like that tree.

I’ll not romanticise that tree glowing white bark, gold, in the lowering sun glorious, proud a monument or—let’s get go there—an epitaph! an epitaph in a dead, empty field beside a highway then, Moving Forward, my own moment passed— Moving Forward— and, from another angle: nothing and, anyway, always just a fucking tree.

why not be a light post? glittered with frost, caught in yellowed headlights

whatever.

I'll not romanticise the drought. the land swollen with significance in blue and gold grotesque or, bleached —yellow, then white, then grey, then white again, like bones— and glowing dull in stark and soft pastel the land solid, cement, and heady with itself death raised into air to cement again in sweat and sun and and spit and all the crevices light, then heavy over everything like objective structure

I don't care. it's pastoral fetishism it's grotesque. or, it would be if it wasn't so fucking boring.

leave it behind.

I'll not romanticise the dust, or the rust, or the coming darkness. or being torn apart in the mud months away from what had meaning months away from the physical things that meant something now photographs and locks of hair it’s not romantic the blue-view glance backward, at the Yarra, through a dusty golden haze. it’s empty the land, I mean. bleached —sepia, then sand, then wheat, then white, like bones— out of focus federation!

leave it behind.

the lie

it's boring

leave the lie —the empty land— the latest layer it’s grotesque do you feel better? because you’re not doing anything

leave it behind

the road

the tree

the light

it’s not

is not

the land

leave it behind

I don’t care.

[wordsbeforebirds]

there are at least sixteen memories more powerful than the Worst Year. twenty four arcs more meaningful. yes—I know—I’m counting again. but this is for effect.

we are not what we were.

whatever we have been, this is not what matters.

I tell people, sometimes, that I used to be romantic. intense. that I gave up.

this is a lie.

I am romantic. utterly. it’s an intensity I can’t find words for. it’s desire, a craving or—no—it’s gnawing addiction… it’s not that, either.

it’s sustenance.

whatever.

it’s consuming.

of course it’s a lie.

this is how we continue to exist.

and, anyway, the word—romantic—is a trap. it’s limiting, I mean.

whatever.

I invest in other emotions. I allow other parts more meaning.

mundane intimacy is infinite. there’s so much more to build on.

committment as a course of action.

so you stop things connecting quite so close. it’s not that you quiet what rises—it’s consuming—but you’re better at the parts that build you. and you see more of them, more in them.

perhaps this is what it means to have a connection to the land.

[wordsbeforebirds]

love forever, or whatever

okay okay okay

slow down

resist

there’s nothing more in this.

we sustain ourselves with stimulants.

slow down.

it’s neither the depth of prose, nor the brilliance of idea. we are misdiagnosed, misprescribed, misinterpreted.

there’s a gap.

we fill it with futures. with fire. with caffeine and desire.

with hashtags and with dance floors and with having ways to rationalise what lingers.

we sustain ourselves with what we steal. with mythologies. with shoes.

with the most perfectly-sequined dress, and pleated skirt, and fitted just close against aching ribs. like, somehow, its tailoring—its perfection—may hold together the mess of flesh and phlegm and philosophy that twist in chaos behind its boning.

we sustain ourselves with meaning and with self loathing: with whatever fills the gaps.

there's gaps.

there is a gap.

where it can creep in. knowledge, or whatever. you know what I mean. knowing. it’s not Exact Events, but it’s worse than fear.

it’s fucked.

sometimes, it’s dark. you wish it was an addiction. like, you wish you could quiet it—numb it—with some kind of abuse.

we sustain ourselves with stimulants.

there is no method in this, no ritual. there’s nothing wrong. whatever.

it’s like … need, or whatever, that feeds itself with its own meaning, or its own means. like drowning in fire, or fire drowning in itself.

we sustain ourselves with stimulants.

stimulants like love.

[wordsbeforebirds]

Forever Inappropriately Dressed

The fox fell first.

Not graceful more the way suede’ll catch in the sheets (when you leave them on the floor). It’s suffocating—you understand—there’s hardly the time.

It might as well have been the morning.

Whatever.

Everything is getting so right.

I mean— Let’s take photographs and write down the things we say. Let’s lose them or forget them and return to them and wonder what the point was.

You were my second-fondest memory.

I like to think, sometimes, that we were tangles of ribbons. Ends that never quite met. A complex web of something. We weren’t, of course. We were only two people who weren’t that greatly in love. And ribbon doesn’t tear, not like flesh.

Whatever.

There’s hardly the time.

And, like, I’m into you in pieces but never to your face.

Or rarely.

A clumsy kind of love, or of whatever. “I got things to write.” A clumsy kind of whatever. A high to ride and crash on.

I’ve spent the past year piling books.

Whatever.

[wordsbeforebirds]

googling sashimi I need it inside my mouth immediately

[wordsbeforebirds]

features thoughts that don’t function

swept aside, like the

[wordsbeforebirds]

just just just

just let's go on

last last

click with me

work it out

whatever