& each time, it is with slick precision.

every year i note the distance

between myself &      the end

by flicking              my thumb

through a dollar store calendar.

the spine, ribbed skeleton   inhaling

                   days crossed off &

exiled to the wasteland, the dump

chained together with last year’s alloys.

                    how is it we know a year

by generation?   gen eighteen, gen x, gen

one,   two,      three,          incapable

of withstanding the world’s concrete

approaching with increasing malice.

overhead, the magpies warble &

i fear nuclear sirens, before finally

the new year has arrived &   my heart

has shattered, showering shrapnel    at the feet

of children frozen   watching winter’s

rocket fire & instead    dreaming

       of fireworks.   the clock has ticked

a minute past

       doomsday & here

i am praying to a vain god

          for a stand–

                               still where

the mid-twenties & i both

cower behind youth’s

                    jagged

                        boundary & drag

a cigarette to floating ash,

            keeping age

at a desperate stalemate.

                     holding time hostage is no strange

feat for a Balmain boy.  ask any boozer from the 80s

                       & they’d tell you the local legend.

the cop that shot the clock a moment before midnight

                                                  & drank until sunrise.

there is some liberty in the retelling of this tale,

                            but it is always from old men,

                 eyes drawn on the grandfather clock.

i know prayer when i see it.

             prayer how we do it.

             a single strand of grey plucked from the scalp.

             prayer like:

                           if i stay here,

reeking of beer taps & loose spirits

               will you leave me my hair?

call me pretty, sweeping over my hazel eyes

            with a tongue-like gaze?

                       call me tonic, call me bittersweet?
no fortune of begging weighs enough

to keep the hands at six.

        every year the world ends & i begin

                  anew / atop the bodies

                              of myself that could not bear

                                   becoming me.   if only

                                                            they could see the sunrise.

                                                                 count each echo from

                                                                        the last bullet dropping.
                                                                                               if only
                                                                                               we buried the dread.