Ode to Banjo

I’ve always wanted to write poetry just like ‘Banjo’ Paterson,

But I’ve neither had the intelligence or the wit.

Words flow from my mouth more easily than my pen,

And I’m often taken by many for a twit.

Banjo wrote of sheep and stockmen, and Clancy of the Overflow;

And characters you found along the track.

He made the past romantic, with somewhat of a lure

And I’ve often wished that I could travel back.

He had a sense of perception not common in our time

Though it was more usual in his day.

He could make you cry with a verse but when you turned the page

His prose would have you laughing all the way.

I could never hope for the skill or even for the wit

To write my verse with Banjo’s kind of flair

For history was his canvas; for colours he used words

And his “paintings” shine with a stately kind of air.

MDC

April ’81

Ball Tampering

A decision made in an unguarded moment

Lightly made as a result of faulty thinking, not realizing

the corrupted logic lying within

And like the decision, the execution of the dastardly deed was

haphazard and poorly discharged

Opening the way for inevitable discovery, making

the obviousness of the shame clear in an instant.

If only that clarity had exploded upon you before the event you would have

realized how puerile and distasteful it would seem to all

and now you wonder how you missed the undisguised rancor

that your behaviour would inescapably make.

Yes, so preventable, but your true motives and intentions

are now broadcast and the world sees that it was not

your decision that was unguarded but your true heart,

and now you are ashamed.

MDC

28/03/2018

Sunday Afternoon

An afternoon zephyr provides just enough

relief from the noon’s heat.

The hammock’s oscillation gently supporting

the whisper of the leaves conversation.

The stillness of the space causing time to halt,

the quietude becoming its own inertia, allowing eternity

room to express its presence.

Not asleep, but not awake, my thoughts idly

meander through the crevices of my mind

like unsupervised rivulets leisurely exploring

undiscovered territories.

The hiatus of body and discontinuity of mind

indistinguishable from each other, the vacuum

extending to the edges of reality.

The bang of back-fire startles the tranquility of the interval’s serenity,

causing the crows to caw and cry in kinned pandemonium;

Their unplanned escape successful nonetheless.

The raucous cacophony of kookaburras in the grey gums

laughing at the dissolution of our reverie.

Dogs bark, offended by the interruption to their siestas,

turning their complaints into a contest to see

who rules the neighbourhood.

A door slams somewhere, as if feeling the need

to join the protest against the rude disturbance,

and getting the last word in,

places a punctuation point on the whole affair.

Time to fire up the barbeque.

MDC

March 2018

On A Windy Day

The tree branches engage in a mysterious dance

An ancient frenzy; dos-à-dos and enchufla

The steps of which remain in taxonomic secrecy known

only to the phylum; even the wind does not understand

the choreographic response of the fronds.

The rhythm of their writhing declaring an impenetrable knowledge.

No matter how long I observe their swing,

sway and shimmy, I am no more learned of their communications than

before the weather changed.

MDC

March 2018

The Cost of Creativity

The cost of creativity is born by few while being enjoyed by the many.

More than material cost or financial cost is the personal cost paid by the artist

Knowing aforehand that they will follow their creativity

regardless that fortune and satisfaction will likely avoid them

Bound to their gift like a slave in chains

even though they feel freedom is not a choice available to them

Unwillingly accepting the inherent emotional risks

that are part and parcel of a creative life

Enduring for long seasons at the hand of their endowment

Undone by their gift, dying a little with the production of each work

And yet renewed a little by success, should it choose to come,

such recompense being elusive and fleeting.

And should success, wealth and fame present themselves

To then have to avoid the so easily stumbled upon offenses

of arrogance, conceit, narcissism, and pomposity.

Resolved that their artistry always leads to anguish

Either via the path of disappointment and exhaustion

Or the flame of fame and adoration.

Perceiving that humanity may be willing to adore their works

But not consider it important enough to purchase

That they will bemoan the poor state of funding by governments,

selfish procurement by corporations and

opportunistic acquisition by the wealthy

but make no effective step towards personal cost

in order to enrich their own lives, endow enterprise with pleasant environment,

or even to maintain the aesthetic culture of society.

For this reason, it is rare to find a truly creative person that is

Free without being wild

Expressive without being excessive

Unrestrained without being intemperate

Solitarian without being reclusive

Melancholy without being saturnine

Can we blame them when

Their solitude turns them into an eremite

Their ill-humour into moody antagonism

Their indiscriminate sins into public excesses

And their attempts at amelioration

produces alcoholic manic-depressives

We approve when a corporation commences an expensive re-engineering of itself

in order to better serve its customers.

We demand that politicians commit to a higher calling than their personal betterment.

We applaud when a sportsman lives on the poverty line in order to reach his goal.

We admire the mother who goes without in order to give to her children.

Why then do we observe with disapproval the artist who gives to the point of emotional bankruptcy for the very thing that brings purpose to themselves and amenity to the world?

MDC

March 2018

Considering Past Misperceptions

He sits, pondering, looking out the lounge window
The curtains billowing from the zephyred evening
The twilight air fretting upon his aging skin
His stubborn thoughts fretting upon his aging mind

His opinions framing his perceptions
like the window curtains filter the tableau through the casement
But a window needs drapery and perhaps the faulty
view is the price to be paid for such lovely curtains.



MDC
March 2018