Forecast

Mothers keep churning us out

like there’s no tomorrow

and maybe there isn’t

for us

I see mammoth cockroaches

picking over the rubble

nonchalant

waiting to evolve into something

more photogenic

Call me cynical but

this radioactive dust

they’re putting in warheads these days

couldn’t be playing up with the weather,

could it?

Memorial at Kuta

Gaudy flags

draped over flowers

and in the background

a pile of burnt shoes

shoes that will not dance

nor be flung off in abandon

or slipped under the bed,

will not wear down on one side,

be left to dry on the verandah

or spattered with rain

from running

through a summer storm

Talkback

a riot broke out

at the radio station

police were called in

to quell the listener response

nursing home residents

addicted to their man’s

frenzied fricatives

voluble vowels

garrulous glottal stops

dubious diphthongs

nagging nasals

and crazed consonants

surged out of their recliner chairs

and headed there in mini-buses

when a stand-in for their man

dared to let a caller ask

why

I wipe my arse on the flag

I wipe my arse on the flag

because it’s just an ocker rag,

a symbol of arse-licking

and brown-nosing dictators

and the colours are wrong,

the colours of empire and subservience.

I wipe my arse on the flag

because it was wrapped around Pauline

and it’s always over Howard’s shoulder,

because 350 people who drowned trying to get here

were deemed unworthy of its protection.

I wipe my arse on the flag

because it flutters over desert concentration camps

and prisons full of young black men

and corporate towers exalting cold hard capital.

I wipe my arse on the flag

because I like the feel

of the union jack in my crack.