Here the glass was doubly terrifying,
Unfolded like two or three great, brutish wings
Of security men, leafing through a foyer
Opened before a steel eye - he began to speak.

And the people, frozen in the concrete spaces,
Hearing the granite rushing and outgushing,
All the myriad words out of time and a life,
And starlight, shimmering through a crooked pane -

They have the power to elect and reject.
But somewhere, flowing deep in the interior vortex,
Pulled through the iris and left to die in a desert,
Crawls a cave of half-human remains,

Grasped out of aether to sit naked on cement,
Clinging wetly with diseased intentions -
Never to see the stone, nor snows of the mountains,
Because life, death and starshine are too short.

Jazz Sonnet: Gravy Train

Step right up! All aboard, track twenty seven!
She's gleaming gold and silver - don't she shine?
That's right people - this is the train to heaven,
Our diner-lounge has complementary wine

Guaranteed to please you - then at the other
End there's a lot of lovely sleeping cars
With fine, pluch quilts, crisp sheets - then there's another
Parlour dome lounge where you can watch the stars!

Passengers in coach, you are not forgotten -
You've got pillows, footrests - the chairs recline!
If you're cold, we've got blankets of fine cotton -
Our job here is to make your trip divine!

Tickets please! Have them ready, folks, for God's
With those who pay, not those who ride the rods.

In Any Dark, In Any Dawn

There lived a cat
With eyes of gold -
And fancy that! -
He loved a mouse
(Or so I'm told)
But in his house
All cats were taught
To hate the mice
Whose fate, if caught,
Was never nice.

And if I loved you less,
And myself more,
They might be laying in the aisles!
My name might fly from shore to shore!
With their bouquets and winning smiles,
They might be pounding at my door!
But I confess,
Your love will be forever worth
More to me than all the Earth.

If soldiers all
Refused to fight,
If those who wear the stripes and stars
Could march beneath a common hat
With those who still bear whipping scars,
If lamb and lion lay down each night
Upon a single mat,
If cat and mouse
Could share a house -
Even a flat! -
Then all our troubles would be small
And Hate's empire would fall.

And if I loved you more,
And myself less,
This endless game of cat and mouse,
This feinting, dodging game of chess
I would not play to take your pawn,
I would not battle to impress.
And in my house,
You're always welcome at my door,
In any dark, in any dawn.

One cat and mouse
Can change the world
(Or so I'm told) -
Out of the fold
They were not hurled,
They were not thrown
Out of the house,
But left alone,
Unharmed, to dwell.
And not only that -
The soldiers swore
To lay down their guns
And not to fight,
They'd work like nuns
To feed the poor,
The lion and the lamb that night
Lay on a single mat,
And both of them slept well,
And thus Hate's empire fell.

And I will play this game no more,
I will not fight to take your pawn,
You're always welcome at my door,
In any dark, in any dawn.

Tar

When water drips disconsolately down panes,
Sweeping the park, and its prehistoric pond,
And arcs of rain that shadow the soft glass,
Washing away trees and the world beyond,

Make everything appear to disappear -

When hollows in the road turn into puddles,
And puddles, after rain through nights and days,
Become so deep and dark that even dinosaurs
Could find themselves trapped in those liquid eyes -

These I know are the days and nights of tar.

I will not drown within your eyes, I said.
But something drew me inwards all the same,
My protestations softer than a whisper
Amongst the louder whispers of the rain,

And I was sucked in to the tar, to drown -

Past bones of mighty prehistoric giants
Who fell before me, struggled to escape,
But failed - now, on display in your museum,
Creatures nobler than I, who share their fate,

Stuck forever in the black tar, sucked down.

Port Arthur

This is no land for the sick or the lame,
Dragged from their mothers' arms and made to run
A young man's gamut of bullet and brick -
There's blood upon the Southern Cross tonight
Which lights up cottages with angry flame.

Here folks grew mad, shut away from the sun -
Buttons in darkened cells their only trick
To keep the spark of sanity alight
While they stared in the face of living hell.

Lives ended where the ruined gaol remains,
A marker for all who struggled and fell:
They sleep uneasily in the calm bay,
The park, where terrible new silence reigns,
And in the pall cast over the bright day.