Rubbed off sky exposes an
undercoat of white that is really
fuzzed, mid-day heat. Birds
change over shifts. Things settle.
Shadow drops under eaves, tier
by tier. Melaleuca is a snowstorm
of bloom in a backyard.
Planes arrive from here and there;
holiday makers, the injured
and dead, today’s interchangeable
destines. A night club blows up
in a tropical paradise. In the
slipstream above the stratosphere,
fear drifts about the globe
as deadly pollen.
*
The day combustible as a
nightclub. Destruction works
in big, blunt gestures. An
explosion is no rediscovery, it’s
return without guide to the
deepest sink hole from whence
hell’s laughter issues. A
sucking into nothingness; void
behind the twin masks of
light and dark. Not repetition
but continuance. Pre-beginnings.
A precise point of death
qua death, not infinity but
limitlessness, pain’s spectrum.
*
Compression of bees,
shrub-shaped, in proton loops,
on cushioned air. Spring!
See the counter, its bright ticking
with fail-safe growth. Who put
it there? this tubular, tight package,
green and red wires running to
hidden terminals - watch the numerals
flick over, air fill with warmth,
this thing ready to go off at a season’s
notice, a bursting forth, flash
of filmic green and bloom
too quick to catch as we exit our
buildings in a rush to see it.
*
Scent makes the air visible,
seasonal; autumn lays its long
scaffolding of shadow under wood
smoke; winter smells of damp
brickwork; spring lifts the lid on
lighter smells - is something
between cleaning fluids or garden.
Only late at night true secrets
and scents are disclosed; summer
tightens. Scent is a map of an
ancient journey. The poem prints -
makes a seal of every season,
its message delivered and read.
An Actual Encounter With The Sun On
My Balcony At France Street
( for Gloria Schwartz )
When the moon slipped its knot
and left a ring for the night to drop
through, and a baggage of stars
thudded on the loading bay
at the other side of the world,
I heard,
“Ho! get up you slack-arse poet,
I want to have a word with you.”
It was the sun.
“This is a surprise,” I yawned.
“Shouldn’t be - you’re the one whose
been whingeing about his own personal light.”
“I must admit,” I conceded, “I
was worried there for a bit.”
“Right,” answered
the sun. He spat at the window turning
it molten.
“You must know by now Stephen,
I visit with a poet every thirty years or so.
Last time it was Frank O’Hara,
and before that,
Mayakovsky. Can’t say it’s your turn
but I’ll stop by anyway.
You’re not a poet for all time but
for your own time. Don’t worry about it.
And forget those supposed poets
the M=E=Z=Z=A=N=I=N=E=S as you call them
caught between the floors: they ain’t going
nowhere.
So get up and make a cup of tea!”
“Sure, care to join me?”
“Only for a minute,” he said, “I’ve got more
important things to do today, like glinting
off the Hauraki Gulf and the iron-clad poppy
of Sydney Tower.
Oh, that reminds me,
then I’m off to San Francisco to wake up that
ex-girlfriend of yours you keep pissing
off with late night calls and false promises.”
By now I could
see the sun was pretty worked up.
“C’mon, forget that crap.
You write some good stuff but you’ve got to
hang in there, and like me it’ll
come to light.”
“Thanks sun.”
“And knock off the guilt trips and stop
getting pissed (in your Sydney dreams, pal!) you’ll
burn yourself out - I recognise the signs.”
“Yeah, seems I have been
a little preoccupied.”
The sun jumped onto my balcony
outside the window.
“You don’t see much of me down here at
POETS’ PALACE - do you?
Move over,
this is the only time I get a look in.”
I propped myself up
on one elbow.
“Remember, you’re not
writing bus-timetables and calling it
‘performance poetry’ like a few I
could name. Stick with the atmospherics,
the true essence of people.
That’s your angle, as mine is now
to brow beat you.
And don’t get into this doomsday kick
either, leave such things to the (small minded).
Honestly,
it’s straight forward focus.”
By now my hangover had
evaporated.
“Hold on sun,
I’ve a few questions.”
“Sorry,” called the sun, receding.
“We’ve had our little talk. Give my regards
to Greece again, if you ever get there.”
And he was gone
and I got up to
another beginning, and a day.
Stephen Oliver b. 1950. Grew in Brooklyn-west, Wellington, New Zealand. One year Magazine Journalism course, Wellington Polytechnic. Radio NZ Broadcasting School. Casual Radio Actor. Lived in Paris, Vienna, London, San Francisco, Greece and Israel. Signed on with the radio ship, ‘The Voice of Peace’ broadcasting in the Mediterranean out of Jaffa. Free lanced as production voice, newsreader, announcer, voice actor, journalist, radio producer, copy and features writer. Poems widely represented in New Zealand, Australia, Ireland, USA, UK, South Africa, Canada, etc. Recently published, Ballads, Satire & Salt - A Book of Diversions, Greywacke Press, Sydney, 2003. Recently completed a CD of poems and music, titled: KING HIT Selected Readings - poems written and recorded by Stephen Oliver with original music by Matt Ottley designed for international release. He is a transtasman poet and writer who lives in Sydney.
This book review is included by the request of the author, and with permission of Nicholas Reid: