Dads play with old train sets -
'It wouldn't kill you to be nice.'
On the soft beach
when there's no surf.
It's the little things you do
for five per cent deposit.
The bar is empty
Send them home to their wives.
The violinist has abandoned
the orchestra, the pits.
Stepping into the great southern ocean
no preservatives, all natural.
Saints on TV
when tomorrow is another day.
The lovebirds should be fun
the actor is now far too old.
The steam age has returned
get the baby and the billy can.
Rates are fixed for six months
but you better finish your beer.
'We'll all die using pills.'
We ride the white horses.
I cannot accept that
the dollar is steady.
About Jill Jones
Jill Jones’ most recent book is Ash Is Here, So Are Stars (Walleah Press, 2012). In 2012, she also published a chapbook, Senses Working Out (Vagabond Press). She has also published six other full-length poetry books, as well as editing, with Michael Farrell, Out of the Box: Contemporary Australian Gay and Lesbian Poets, in 2009. She won the Kenneth Slessor Poetry Prize 2003 for Screens Jets Heaven: New & Selected Poems and the Mary Gilmore Award 1993 for The Mask and the Jagged Star. She has collaborated with visual and sound artists on a number of text-image projects. Her work has featured in recent anthologies including the Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature and The Penguin Anthology of Australian Poetry. She has been a film reviewer, journalist, book editor and arts administrator. She currently teaches at the University of Adelaide.
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