Jackson

I wake in the dusty light      to the deepcity cockcrow      of traffic and stair-thumping      housemates My bag’s by the wall My boots are on the floor My clothes are rumpled all over me I’m lying under a coat      I found up the road      and two thin throws that I wouldn’t      call blankets There’s empties on… Read more

That man and I      were standing on the street      with a group of fellow artists      watching a performance. I stood just in front of him. He put his hands on my shoulders,      slid them down my arms,      stroked my hands. I leaned back against him. He leaned against me. We didn’t say anything. He was… Read more

I dreamed a gun like Dirty Harry’s, a Magnum, phallic silvercoloured barrel I dreamed a gun and a lock A lock on a blank room where I had to hide the gun A lock on a blank room with an ancient drawer full of other people’s junk where I had to hide the gun We… Read more

I have to admit, U2 are not what they were. They are slower, less able to stretch and risk. They have a routine. They come out wrapped in layers of production. But they will always be my band. The love is like the eye light of a time-marked woman still looking at the grizzled man… Read more

Mattie Furphy House June 2012 On the path below the verandah where I sit, discreet, discrete occasional clusters, twos, fives, pass. A man exercising an unpleasant dog. A woman striding fifteen feet behind him. She projects her clauses toward his shoulderblades: “As she said, y’can get away with buying cheap shoes, but then Whammo! it… Read more

The face appears as if upon a screen. The image taunts me every night in bed. The Muse personified, a handsome man with lips that all the women ache to feed. “O will you be my Muse personified and let me touch your mystery with my pen?” I warble, when, inside my errant head, the… Read more