the dream of the river shark

with two fins guess it's one each

for soup & killing & this bleak fracture

of morning in a dish can't survive

unless tv spliced / the green LCD

of the clock-radio-phone like a

baby caught in flashbulb headlights

or photograph of a cracked head &

the ads up here are weird / best to

avoid or point to the nearest saint

even if painted & name him/her

now living in a bag & calling you

Bob Marley outside the casket in this

no-way Trenchtown of blackbirder

sprinklers & streets lined with card

tables & poofs hiding each other's

arse cracks / the queue to get flogged

in the unwaxed predatory man-shadow of

Castle Hill & these eggs remind me / make

our first morning in Agra all Dr. Suess in UP

you know? – green eggs & ham? – & I feel

as empty & sick except alone & surrounded

by Australiana bullshit & maybe it's this

morning & the desolation that has filled me

but I'm thinking so fucken what? about everything

in particular the richness & adventure of our

native land & the famous range of sweetmeats

that are wholeheartedly enjoyed by everyone & the

neo-American smile of Clancy & his ten-gallon

hat & self-supporting trousers with 'Tauttex' like

Bradman or bullfights / tits in your face & the Anzacs

hit Cairo hell-bent for tea-towels & dripping from

room service your voice becomes distant an electrical

hum & skin worn as sodium / a strange ominous streetlight

& the exaggerated movements of the poet exude

an anxious yet winsome charm / the odd atmosphere.

pick a day from the mojo calendar or night will find

me listening to Frusciante in the garage in the darkness

singing 'hey, the way go forward & the way go back' &

poncho/toothpick close-ups minus the spurs again the walk

towards Spring Street is quiet the air conditioner outside

the corner shop drips with insistence & heavy like rain

in Brunei where visitors stare from elliptical portholes in sheets

of condensation / as windows or Christmas lights / a city of

candles beside a highway & the smell of wet paper

perhaps currency? the sock-puppet/marionette children &

their coconut sweets pink bicycle mailbox on my tongue at

low tide & the shower-curtain you in the hotel like we said at the stairs

between drinks & organics / the smell of leaf litter / your neck