Placeville

those painless

               virus people

          trapped

     in the spam folder

could break a mirror

           to fall into

    after

      a bottle of wine,

it's then the spondee

                 doesn't matter

 

happy birthday

            you're seven(ty),

        as fractious as ever,

alkali and acid

 

I'll eat my mistakes

           and promise to read

       the printouts

 

you never phone me

                  you said

     you're no longer

                going to the movies

because they mimic

           our ordinariness,

our limitedness,

             they just iterate

                     a fucking annoying

          rhetoric of sincerity,

but I'd like to see

                   'The Master'

     and 

         Duncan Jones'

        science fiction films

    could be some kind

                   of amelioration

though

           you have your theories

 

the clandestine project's

           secrecy

        is

               worth examining

 

I wanted to tell you

                 your photos

            of passing encounters,

       you standing beside

famous

     English-language poets

         and famous poets' graves,

 don't make you

                     any more of a poet,

but then I didn't care.

 

with those vaccination scars

            you pretend

you've travelled

          when you wake up

      under vines, vanilla pods,

                     vetiver grass,

  weed-carpeted craters,

                the sun going down

 

running home

              to soda water,

       pig hocks, mangoes,

              a telethon

        and a band of what

  at the front

                 of your head

 

one side dry

                one side wet

    island topography,

 tying down tarps

                    before the tornado.

    If Box struck by lightning -

    not working -

    plug in Black Cable

    straight to TV.

technician's note

       sticky-taped

             to the magazine rack

 

horoscope 

      you're a dynamic presence

      but a casual player

      and that's exactly

      how it should be

 

through a tinted windscreen

            the past piles up 

     and  

          arrives again 

                    piles up again

 

the true picture

           of the past

                       flits by                                                      

 

on the periphery

                     it's strange,

    you're wearing

                   your best blouse 

       for the memorial

 

                time fills up

 

you're looking

                   academic,

   looking bourgeois,

      little blobs of red dirt

                 on the axminster

(british)

 

it's strange,      

      sash windows

             are

           anecdotal

(british)

 

the fence is a thesis

 

who is

         the comprador here?

 

in 'Ham House' !

                      no thankYOU -

stomping off

               in a huff,

bits of umbrage

                         strewn

       down the hallway

(british)

 

tantrum fragments 

   pool

      like letters & numbers

                   in your dna

 

at the reception

 

individual fractions

            of wasabi

  pink out

        consciousness

 

it's strange,

          sharply focused photos

no one cares to look at

 

a grey area,

       what you're doing

  here

and what you think

                  you're doing

       here

 

camera camera

                    a lens

      in each pore

              in every cranny

 

everyone 's

            laughing now,

  the eulogist's on a roll,

                 holy roller

 

I really want

               to write my name,

   P.Brown,

                in pencil

        inside your book

 

fifteen years ago

       a fishing boat

  half-sunk

       in Blackwattle Bay,

  everything still,

                    the best poet

                 had dropped dead

 

instant classic

 

mineral consciousness

           protects the mendicant

      applying for a grant

                    for tonal poems

 

hairdresser electronica

           makes you feel

      like

         DOING something

 

three men in a cherry picker

             thirty metres up

   dropping

           orange basketballs

                     to the ground,

 a high bounce test

        that makes

               invention trivial

 

I want to do this -

    please verify

    you are human

    by following

    the directions

    in the graphic,

                      but I can't

 

what happened

               happened

 

turning easterly

            in the evening

      the situation shifts

 between Point Danger

                 and Gabo Island,

      two unknown places

 

nowhere better

               or worse

    to calculate

                a beautiful dullness,

  and lucky enough

              to be right in the path

            of the radar