.
If I write on floral paper will my words sound sweeter?
Will they ring with gentle laughter and tales that make you smile?
I write frantically in the hope that a page with lacy edges and a silver sheen soften the anguish when you leave me.
I pray for it to mute the crushing sound of your heart as I write that I’m leaving you.
You did this to us.
I cry because you left me, and I cry on days like today because the sun is shining and the air is warm and the breeze tickles my cheek.
But I asked you to go.
I wish to call you and suggest we have one of those wonderful picnics we use to have.
When we didn’t have any money, and it didn’t matter.
And your heart crushes on the page that I wrote you.
And the hurt leaks out, rippling across the page to seek out the pen as it scratches the paper.
I watch in wonder as the pen inhales it brutally
It undulates like a silent ocean rip within the ink, spreading slowly to the tips of my fingers
There it stains, as I tell you that I love you.
I’m leaving.
I flick through the notebooks, careful not to drop a piece of your pain from the tip of my torn nails
I pick another piece of paper and start again.
I find the prettiest piece. Its blue. Softly blue.
But there is that sound, loud and clear as I write with the leaking pen and my stained fingers.
I’ll never stop loving you.
It’s your heart, crushing on the paper.
.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Yellow Eyes
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I like to lie on my back on the grass with my eyes shut. I do this often on my lunch break, whenever the sun promises to peek from behind the clouds. I stare at the sun through closed lids. The heat warms my veins and the rays permeate the transparency of my flesh. When my eyes flicker open, the world has a golden hue. The grass has a luminescence, the buildings have soft ochre tones and the leaves on the trees, turning now because its autumn, have little gold rims. Everything I look at is bathed in yellow, and its somehow more magical.
I cannot help but reminisce about when I used to look through dads old sunglasses. As a child I would pick them up, ever so gently, and slide the giant metal frames over my freckled face. They sat there well, on account of my nose being quite turned up back then. He would doze on the couch, and I would make off with them, admiring the burnt yellow lenses – such was the seventies. Sometimes I would put them on and stand at the front window, marvelling at how they could change the colours of our garden, the passing cars, and the people that traversed the footpath. I would lift them away from my face, and drop them again, giggling at how I could make people go brown like the Jendayi family. Mum said they were “ethnics”, I never found out what kind, dad didn’t really like me playing near their house. They moved away after a few years, I think because they didn’t have many friends. I’d play with dad’s glasses by the window for as long as he would sleep. If he’d been to the bottle-o after his shift, then I got to play with them for longer, because he’d always sleep longer then. I’d sit patiently on the footrest, watching the afternoon news with him, until he nodded off.
Dad would always yell if he ever caught me with his glasses. They were his favourites and he’d had them as long as I could remember. One day I did not see him coming, and he had yelled with such ferocity that I’d dropped them. He snatched them off the ground and rammed them onto his face. He gripped my arm very hard and jerked me towards him. “Whaddaya think you’re doing boy!?” he boomed as he shook me. I froze up then, because I feared what he might do to me if I told him that I’d been playing with them. So I didn’t say anything. He lent down and brought his nose close to mine, digging his nails into my arm. He stared at me intently through the ochre lenses, and I remember thinking how yellow his eyes looked. He leant closer, and I could smell the dark liquor on his breath. He slapped me then, because I didn’t answer him. The handprint had glowed immediately. I should have answered him, then I wouldn’t have been hit. I tried not to cry because it was my fault, but the second time he slapped me, it whipped my head around and rogue tears had trickled down my cheek. But they didn’t wash away the red welt. They never did.
He relaxed then, and the anger subsided as quickly as it had risen. He had sighed, using me to push himself upright. He tousled my hair and walked back to the TV room, talking over his shoulder as he walked out, “I love you kid, but you fucking shit me to tears”. I always thought later on that if I had just stopped taking his glasses, he might have loved me that bit more. But I couldn’t help it, I loved how the my parents house looked through them, and I loved that with a flick of my wrist, I could distort the colours of my world.
From that day on, I’d always taken extra care when I snuck off with his glasses. I’d sneak off to the back of the horses paddock, and walk around, pretending to be dad. I’d always add a little swagger, because dad always had a beer belly. And I’d talk to our chestnut mare Bella, mimicking dad’s gravelly tone. And I’d always wear the glasses, and Bella would always glow a golden burning orange beyond them. And then I’d traipse back to the house, flicking the sunglasses up and down as I went. I was always careful to return them just as I had found them.
When dad died of liver failure in 1983, they buried him with his sunglasses. I remembered how his face was coloured behind them, that day he slapped me, and I thought to myself that now his eyes would be yellow forever. When I was much older, I realised that dads’ eyes were already yellow, and that he was probably dying for as long as I could remember. As now, as I lay on my back on this crisp autumn day, I hope to god that I will never wear yellow glasses again, and that the tingling I feel behind my eyes when I lay on my back will always fade away.
.
I like to lie on my back on the grass with my eyes shut. I do this often on my lunch break, whenever the sun promises to peek from behind the clouds. I stare at the sun through closed lids. The heat warms my veins and the rays permeate the transparency of my flesh. When my eyes flicker open, the world has a golden hue. The grass has a luminescence, the buildings have soft ochre tones and the leaves on the trees, turning now because its autumn, have little gold rims. Everything I look at is bathed in yellow, and its somehow more magical.
I cannot help but reminisce about when I used to look through dads old sunglasses. As a child I would pick them up, ever so gently, and slide the giant metal frames over my freckled face. They sat there well, on account of my nose being quite turned up back then. He would doze on the couch, and I would make off with them, admiring the burnt yellow lenses – such was the seventies. Sometimes I would put them on and stand at the front window, marvelling at how they could change the colours of our garden, the passing cars, and the people that traversed the footpath. I would lift them away from my face, and drop them again, giggling at how I could make people go brown like the Jendayi family. Mum said they were “ethnics”, I never found out what kind, dad didn’t really like me playing near their house. They moved away after a few years, I think because they didn’t have many friends. I’d play with dad’s glasses by the window for as long as he would sleep. If he’d been to the bottle-o after his shift, then I got to play with them for longer, because he’d always sleep longer then. I’d sit patiently on the footrest, watching the afternoon news with him, until he nodded off.
Dad would always yell if he ever caught me with his glasses. They were his favourites and he’d had them as long as I could remember. One day I did not see him coming, and he had yelled with such ferocity that I’d dropped them. He snatched them off the ground and rammed them onto his face. He gripped my arm very hard and jerked me towards him. “Whaddaya think you’re doing boy!?” he boomed as he shook me. I froze up then, because I feared what he might do to me if I told him that I’d been playing with them. So I didn’t say anything. He lent down and brought his nose close to mine, digging his nails into my arm. He stared at me intently through the ochre lenses, and I remember thinking how yellow his eyes looked. He leant closer, and I could smell the dark liquor on his breath. He slapped me then, because I didn’t answer him. The handprint had glowed immediately. I should have answered him, then I wouldn’t have been hit. I tried not to cry because it was my fault, but the second time he slapped me, it whipped my head around and rogue tears had trickled down my cheek. But they didn’t wash away the red welt. They never did.
He relaxed then, and the anger subsided as quickly as it had risen. He had sighed, using me to push himself upright. He tousled my hair and walked back to the TV room, talking over his shoulder as he walked out, “I love you kid, but you fucking shit me to tears”. I always thought later on that if I had just stopped taking his glasses, he might have loved me that bit more. But I couldn’t help it, I loved how the my parents house looked through them, and I loved that with a flick of my wrist, I could distort the colours of my world.
From that day on, I’d always taken extra care when I snuck off with his glasses. I’d sneak off to the back of the horses paddock, and walk around, pretending to be dad. I’d always add a little swagger, because dad always had a beer belly. And I’d talk to our chestnut mare Bella, mimicking dad’s gravelly tone. And I’d always wear the glasses, and Bella would always glow a golden burning orange beyond them. And then I’d traipse back to the house, flicking the sunglasses up and down as I went. I was always careful to return them just as I had found them.
When dad died of liver failure in 1983, they buried him with his sunglasses. I remembered how his face was coloured behind them, that day he slapped me, and I thought to myself that now his eyes would be yellow forever. When I was much older, I realised that dads’ eyes were already yellow, and that he was probably dying for as long as I could remember. As now, as I lay on my back on this crisp autumn day, I hope to god that I will never wear yellow glasses again, and that the tingling I feel behind my eyes when I lay on my back will always fade away.
.
Friday, May 22, 2009
Friday Fog
Image by http://stephensoo.blogspot.com/2009/04/melbourne-shrouded-in-fog.htmlI am awake before the birds are today.
Mind you, it’s a little after 7am and it’s only the fog that keeps them sleepy. I can see them in the trees all puffy and cute wrapped in dewy grey blankets.
I wish to stay home today, to sit by my window and watch the sunshine burn the layers of fog, to toast the birds until they stir and press their feathers back to their skin, because they are warm. And they will sing and feed, and poo on my car. And I will watch them, and write. But I have to go to work. In the city. Amongst the buildings, up high. With my computer and my photocopier and my crappy cappuccino machine. And the in-tray that rivals Mount Everest.
And then, when I DO get to work ...I write about how I want to be at home. Writing. And watching the birds poo on my car, once the sun burns away the fog.
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Friday, May 1, 2009
The Ultimate 21st Century Baby Present
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courtesy of Michi Girl http://michigirl.com/newsletter/melbourne/1708/budding-bunny-beneficiary/
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Learning Consumerism for all ages... including tiny tots. Teach em young!
courtesy of Michi Girl http://michigirl.com/newsletter/melbourne/1708/budding-bunny-beneficiary/
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