Poems – Page 214 – Ivor.Plumber/Poet

Living On A Knife Edge

I’m posting this piece on “Go Dog Go Cafe” as part of there fabulous “Promote Yourself Monday” and a warm thank you to Michelle, for the invite

Fire, fire, there’s raging fires

I need help to stamp out the flames

Burning down the ancient timber bridge

The traveller’s last causeway to the edge

Spanning today’s harsh realities

Carrying life’s dreams and fantasies

Rain, rain, there’s a Noah’s flood

I need help to stall the inundating mud

Fill the sandbags with the smouldering dead bugs

Smother these smelly thoughts of soaking rugs

Filter off the qualms and doubts

Leaving doctor’s drugs and grey-matter handouts

Warning, warning, outside there’s a heatwave

I need help to see through the dusty haze

Turn off the fiery furnace tonight

Close the doors, the fireflies are alight

Open your eyes, and view the glowing sights

Beyond the smoke, and life’s future delights

A Drought Of Tears In The Sky

Last night I tossed and turned, restless in my warm bed. I was dreaming these words tumbling around in my head

A Drought Of Tears In The Sky

How many empty clouds are floating in the sky

Before all the dark linings wave goodbye

How many lakes of sorrow will run dry

Before all the shallow waters will die

How many barren rivers must we try

Before all the deepest wells smell high

My hidden wishing well has run bone dry

I’ve no more flooding tears left to cry

Under The Shady Red-gum Tree

In response to The Weekly Photo Prompt : Red << Click

My little red sparrow’s eating salad tonight

Topped with fresh red cherry tomatoes

We’re dining at Noah’s wooden window sill

Dangling our legs over the edge

Into unknown red-mud waters

Tossing chewed-up bones to Judas

My sparrow’s now chirpy and cheeky

Retelling Judas the story, what if this is, as good as it gets

The little red sparrow’s wing is slowly healing

Resting under the shady red-gum tree.

Reg Gum. The Last Frontier. Lyrics.

There’s a corrugated highway Leading north from Port Augusta
Lined with ratted cars that didn’t rate a tow
The Salt plains out of Pimba And your eyes begin to stream
On to Kingoonya huddled dusty by the road
Romantic notions shattered Like the tyres that didn’t hack it
This has got to be the country’s last frontier
Where a sports car’s next to useless Running cattle grids and river beds
We drove a van from 1963

Someone mentioned walkabout And kiss your job goodbye
Just to see the country shimmer through the windscreen
Drinking beer, telling stories While laughter filled the night
And flexi-time’s behind you like a bad dream

You got a flat on ANZAC Highway And Lawson on your shelf
Its a Southern Comfort, air-conditioned rage
Where a homestead’s more than just a cheap print Dangling from a wall

And mateship’s more than lines upon a page

We went looking for Australia In between the TV lines
‘Cause the ABC just couldn’t make it real
Colour documentary From a beanbag on the floor:
Never shows as much as it conceals

A stark and blistered Alice Springs And a river runs with shame
And you wipe the sheets of bulldust from your eyes
Another country’s uniform And the mirage it falls apart
To the open gap between the truth and lies

Climbing A Rabbit Proof Fence

Today has been one of those days

I’ve been out walking my relay

Listening to the sound of my shuffling feet

Scraping on cobblestones, of the hot city street

A tiredness overcame my body

Searching for the famous Doctor Peabody

I think I collapsed under a wall

The Great Wall Of China

The Berlin Wall

Israel’s Palestinian barricade

The Iron Curtain

Trump’s Mexican wave

Australia’s Rabbit Proof Fence

And my next door neighbour’s big brick wall

I was bulldozed by them all

In a barrel, jumping off Niagara Falls

I’m an arctic sperm whale, beached at Bondi

And the angler at a dry Buckley’s Falls pond

I’m a spawning salmon with no rapids to swim

Today’s battle I lost, on a whim

I’ve been nailed to yesterday’s, burnt out cross

I need a day of rest, to shake off the moss

There’s always a new tomorrow waiting

Yorkie will be there, patient and obeying

Walking shoes ready, at the end of my bed

A good night’s sleep, nothing more need be said

I thoroughly recommend, that you watch this haunting and moving movie, ” Rabbit Proof Fence”

Intrusion

I didn’t realise I had written so many of these sort of “life as a carer” poems, these were written years ago, when I was struggling with the process of coping…… Please do not over react, many years have gone by, I’m Ok these days. Hopefully my words may help other carers that maybe in a similar situation, and realise that they are not alone out there, with their thought and doubts

Intrusion

The process of being alive

Such an intrusion on going awry

The engagement of caring in life

Such an intrusion on living to get bye

The labour of toiling for pay

Such an intrusion on flying away

The dishonour of begging for more

Such an intrusion on failing to score

The exhaustion of continuing to care

Such an intrusion on needing to dare

The silence of the evening moon

Such an intrusion on hearing too soon

The explosion of morning sunlight

Such an intrusion on pleading for quiet

The disharmony of singing this song

Such an intrusion in sighing, so long

Beyond Sunset

The day here is very hot again, hot enough to fry an egg on my front window sill, 107’F, at midday !! I found this poem that I posted last year on February 25th, it must’ve been hot back then too. I hope you enjoy the re-run.

Gradually the dying moonlight awakened my dawn

And the baptizing sunrise watered my eyes

Drowning the working hours of my shallow day

Dampening fiery thoughts of playing in the hay

Dusk hazily shrouds my cemetery lawn

And the rituals of sunset beckon my evening plight

Flailing and falling upon sleepless night

Finally laying prone under my weighted crown

Hear The Thunder

My tired voice is crying out, “there’s no time to wait !!”

Pleading, along with the world’s impatient majority

We need to hear the thunder, of peace bells ringing

Ringing to the crescendo of peace doves singing

The chimes are loud and clear

Loud enough for the universe to hear

Even through white marble walls

You’ll hear the thunder of the peace bell’s … call

We the people, from the planet’s four corners

Are united by our textiles woven together

We’ve attached our hands firmly to the bell pull

And tugging the pull cords, the thunder of the bells shall ring

We are gathering in every backyard

Every church hall

Every city street

Every farmers paddock

Every heavenly peace dove is escaping

You will see the doves flying high above

Even through the towers of tinted glass

You’ll see the peace doves … soar

Even through their white marble walls

They’ll hear the thunder of the peace bells … call

Even through their towers of tinted glass

They’ll hear the crescendo of the peace doves … call

Hear the thunder of peace bells ringing

Hear the crescendo of peace doves singing

Rainbows In The Sky

How blue can our blue sky beam

Before the sun’s fireball burst at the seams

The day is hotter than a smith’s melting pot

During the heat did mother earth lose the plot

All her rainbows have vapourised and waved us goodbye

The hidden gold has been stolen by the lord of the flies

There’s a cloudless horizon, as far as eyes can see

Even too hot for the industrious garden bees

Yorkie stands square, with a blazing black seat

Not to be sat on, like a boiling iron roofing sheet

Time to give the roasting body a rest

Lie down with a cooling fan, blowing over the chest

A Midday Sun

We have had weeks of blue skies and summer sunshine down here in Geelong, and there’s lots more to come they say. I thought I’d repost this poem of mine from January last year, and for you northern hemisphere readers, maybe it’ll warm you up a bit

A Midday Sun

Have you ever looked up at a Midday Sun

Shining through the weeping forest canopies

A golden glowing furnace, that’s larger than life

Glaring down, from there above

Have you ever flown up to touch the Midday Sun

Travelling through that deep blue sky and beyond

A vortex of colour, reflections of rainbows

Cascading down, from there above

Have you ever been blinded by the Midday Sun

By that purity of brilliant white

Forcing your singed eyelids to shut tight