Rising

I’ll rise 

because no mother showed me how

I’ll rise 

because my father still thinks I shouldn’t 

I’ll rise 

because my daughter needs a guide 

I’ll rise 

because my son has a flight of his own

I’ll rise 

because these wings feel wasted 

No step too close to the edge

no breath too large to inhale 

none of the advice felt more suited than that of the hearts I trust 

With the loving justice of the trees

The scope of duty 

our precious invitation to adorn our bodices in flora dried 

and floral bright 

let there be pure safety 

for our wolven hearts howling at the cloudless night 

Claiming the moons glow 

as a gift for the generations we leave this land to.

 Begging for forgiveness of that torture the generations before us betrayed it with. 

Oh sacred indigenous hearts 

let me rise 

rise in your eyes 

Rise 

worn like a skin 

Around your bare shoulders

Dancing around the fire 

Rise and fall in the corridors of huons

banksia 

and 

rivers that slither from the mountains 

Clear and clean 

Rising in the warmth of summer 

Rise for the seasons to come 

I shall rise 

like I’ve never known anything else 

Ever known

Any

Thing

Else

RISE with me 

Women 

Your girls have found a new blood 

Cleaner than we have been told it to be 

Rise to its cycle 

Rise with its release

Be gifted with a womb 

So important 

So as to import 

A portal 

From once beyond 

To the tethers of now 

Now rehearse 

This song 

Learn these words

We shall not be wiped away 

by any pronoun 

We shall rise like a spirit in the night 

You are nerveless and without fringes of fright 

Rise because you are the giver of life – new generations needing to learn a language less violent

A language with empathy and profound force  

Rise to the new rebellion of warriors with peace 

Risen for all

I shall be 

The beginning of this story 

For all not just me

Seeds

There’s a lonely place 

sometimes seen on my face 

Resting in my heart 

because from 

         family I’m apart 

No matter how lush the view 

All I want is them & you 

The bubble floats from 

         state to state 

Home after home I make 

Simmering slowly with ease

where will I plant my trees?

When will I be in the company 

of those that know & love me?

Lie

This time it’s ok

To let them just think

It’s only in me

This feeling of shame

Lie I did

Did they need the truth?

No one said 

tell me true

How’d it feel

When it swept away ?

What is it like 

To loose it all ?

This time is ok

To make it brave

It’s only the thoughts

That make it real

Snapshot – 

Just frame it

Then it’s not 

In your head 

It’s just a lie 

That guilt won’t deny

Have it your way

For once 

Let them believe

It’s all ok

All the dreams 

Of happy days

Blending the night

Into morning hues

Calls to the heart 

Those stories let you down 

Keep them feeling 

They won’t drown 

Another day

Another day 

Creeping forward 

Falling inward 

It’s a snapshot 

Screen shot 

Noose knot 

Forget me not 

It’s ok to lie about 

How much I miss 

all that’s gone 

I’ll make it brave 

I’ll make it

So solid

Seeing 

No bridges 

Only walls

Alone to bed 

while you play 

Imaginary 

Violent games 

hardening you 

Solid 

rings around your eyes 

So solid 

Remember when we hired cars

To drive to Big Day Out

I didn’t want my 

HT Holden wagon 

any older 

Down that highway 

we smoked spliffs 

On the rooftop 

of my beach apartment 

we fought so hard 

you smashed your phone 

Eventually that anger 

turned its fist to me

I was not afraid 

I knew how 

to hurt you more 

than my bruises

More than that day 

you kicked my breath away 

Sometimes I wonder 

Have I had enough 

Were broken bridges 

as noticeable 

As these walls 

Solid

So solid 

Alone with all these 

packed away memories 

Confusing the bliss 

with accepting forget 

Remember how our paths 

never grew together 

Not even children 

entwined our beliefs 

I know you bless 

your food 

with lost sight 

Engage in unnatural light 

Are we loosing height

Solid 

So solid 

I used to want 

us to never be broken 

Your trauma 

a language if it’s own

I would learn 

I had to 

To love that too 

All of you 

that’s what I do 

Now, I see through mine

Every fault I gained 

From not loving 

the language 

my trauma gave me 

For giving others 

what I never learnt 

to prepare for me 

Remember when we shot

my rifle in the bush

Guns were cool 

When I was growing up 

You had never had one 

yet had lived a life 

of gangster ways 

Remember when I called the radio

Requested ‘Road to Nowhere’

You smashed your guitar 

and still I didn’t

put it all together. 

Look at us now  

Another guitar gone 

teaching your son 

Ways of black n white

Neglecting your daughter 

Like she is some ex 

done you wrong 

All I hear is Talking Heads

On repeat 

All I feel is my breath 

caught in my shock 

Solid

So solid 

is my fear

Daddy’s girl

I wanted to feel free

of wanting

Wanting you to ask me

Something

That showed you cared

Anything

To reveal that you had wondered

how I might be

How they are – how their birthdays were

How our lives are without you in it.

Being free would mean I’d finished caring

What you thought of me

It might mean I could finally work

On losing my codependency with every other relationship

Being free would mean

I had learnt my lesson

That this is my work to do

This abandonment you glaze over

It’s mine to own

I may not be free to speak

So superficially as you

I may not yet be free

From the neglect.
I am though

Free

I am free of judging myself

because of the judging by you.

Firewood Heart

The curl of dusk

not tight

just right 

wandering within 

the sky

Wisping web strands 

Singing out 

Singling out an area

A private space 

Notice the tiny mixture 

Of moisture 

and moss 

clinging to life 

Youthful fern powder 

Bracken bunches 

Tiny protein pockets 

oh nutty pleasure 

Fungi micro dance 

Illuminating the early 

mystic 

the universal converse

Swaying 

Arcing heavenwardly 

together 

alone 

In unison with 

silent songs beneath 

Culminating breaths 

Macro world your voice 

is humble 

and overwhelming 

I crumble 

into and beyond 

your perfection 

Micro finds 

I become you 

from where my organs 

rumble 

This life

I stumble 

Yet you give 

and give 

To simply live 

and live 

and live again

Worlds Work

Imagine being able to disconnect from all the places
In your body that hurt
Escaping the old ideas that
Hold you back
Waking from a sleep that’s
Gone on for too long

Imagine never replaying hurtful words
in your mind
Stirring the uncertain empty spaces.
Embracing new things that make you smile
Completing one of the big dreams that
reside in your heart.

Imagine being the you that often hides
from those around you.
Seperate from your power.
Distant voices calling your system to
Become light and loving.

Imagine feeling a soft hum within your body?
your cells so similar they are
To the vibrionic wishes of the Earth.
Restore you and be the opening.

Be tremendous joy & not poison.
Imagine what you could become with the entire
World behind you?

Skinny girl

Riding down Main st

on your mongoose handlebars

Feeling chosen & suddenly cooler

than anyone in my crew

Couldn’t wait to stop

imagining your lips to mine

I’d chosen you

long before you’d found me

Curled up on a Papasan chair

I couldn’t kiss you

After a whole year

Hungry to be heard

but silenced by my fears

when the Machine of insecurity takes over

you just had to trust

I was in there

somewhere amongst

the silly stories

I told you & the world

Of why I wasn’t good enough

mad with doubt

Self conscious

skinny girl

Double A hide away

We had made it

to our second year

celebrating with Fleetwood Mac on repeat

Tusk tangled into

Your tenderness

Finally finding me

I couldn’t scream loud enough

to drown you out

saturating all my dreams

every plan & stepping stone

Was moulded with you

until full of fear

I began to craft loosing you

felt it biting at my Achilles

close enough to sever

No matter how clean our future seemed.

All the promises of forever

no matter

who we loved

where we lived

how we ended

We would be forever

Be there

ever for

Forever

Oh why wasn’t I good enough

mad with doubt

Self destructive

skinny girl

Double A hide away

All the addictions

Came and went

Tidal rising to fill

The empty ness

Of love never fulfilled

Of smoking tears

dancing into the pain

doing lines until I drowned

In lies I told myself

Of why I wasn’t worthy

of a friend without doubt

Self assured

skinny girl

Double A hide away

I said farewell

To the moon one night

imagining you as a father

your face cradled

in the scent of a baby boy

not ours

I knew then

It would never be ours

I wanted to be looking

into the life you made

To see the grandness

you were destined to be

Soaked in love like you

Created the language

a dialect I’d couldn’t grasp

I surrendered to my life of picking partners & places so pretty

all I had to do

was never think of you

caged on that Peninsular

with everyone I ever knew

Speaking a language

full of money & familiars

I doubted everything

I felt for you

mad with doubt

Of why I wasn’t good enough

Self conscious

skinny girl

Double A hide away

All the promises

of forever

no matter who we loved

where we lived

how we ended

We would be forever

Be there

ever for

Forever

the memento

I go about my day, leaning where I can, because physically I actually need help. I actually feel weak when I listen to my lonely heart. I have to hold the bench or door frame, shower wall or sink …. I often get swept out to a sea of overwhelmingly hot confusion. I love being able to miss you & glorify our epic ability to actually make this work. I think we rock (hardcore) but I also think we’re effin mad! My physical weakness & mental blackouts at time shock me. How good a parent am I being if my body is kinda slapping me back into realty from time to time? I am driven by love. Keeping love the theme for everything the kids & I explore, the base for what we, as their parents, are trying to achieve. LOVE for each other in this case, that has survived the years & lane changes, adjusted to career moves & interstate stressEs, has reduced itself to a low flame, proving that nothing, full of hard core flames, can last. The slow burn is so industrious & sensual, so real and recognisable. Like a huge menu that demands to be read & spoken of before ordering. We have a buffet of stories & lessons — but nothing, NOTHING is as drenched in learning as this meal on our plate right now. This offering, this choice. This situation we have chosen. Were all the options rinsed out. Were all the plans thought through? Did we truely discuss what pulling the pin on it would do?? Pulling the pin. That’s what my heart wants to do. It wants to run away and hid behind tombstones, waiting to be found in an afternoon game of hide n seek. My heart wants you to turn up at the door with all your things & say ‘that’s it, I’m done! We are starting over!’ My heart wants every weekend to be soberly walking new dirt with you. My heart wants to fall asleep beside you each night, knowing we will stir with the others dream cycle in the early hours. When it rains, my heart wants my hand to find yours. When the moon is halved, my heart asks my words to be those that invite you outside to view the drenching perspective.
Right now my heart wants to give up being brave & just wants to wave a little white flag … no one else has to see, just you. To know deep down that no matter how big our plans are – without you by my side they feel so small and futile.
Without you, no story, no journey, no meal, no drive, no clean sheets or fresh paste mouth ever really matters. It’s just another thing I do without you.
Without you, I can’t live.

Aching heart

Longing arms

Lonely lips

Patient love

REM come

Maybe today I can 
ingest something 
& let it digest 
Instead of fingers 
forcing it out 

Eyes watered 
Hands soapy 
Heart frail 

Maybe today I can 
get through the hours 
without diazepam   
softening all sharp 
& callus edges 

Body languid 
tongue tied 
mind blank 

Remembered childhood 
like the wooden floor 
scratched by the dogs
never clean 
never not unseen 

saturated days
endless skies
minus religion 


Suicide stole her answers 
as if they needed 
a home to haunt 
screaming & banging 
forcing wake into eyes so tired 

you’re where
Sleep drifts 
REM come 

Dreams bring her to my street 
wandering to the edge 
of Redcliffe beaches 
in plastic shoes 
& Fluro earnings 

Laughing nights 
Filmclip mornings 
Jaffle lunches 

Sister you felt like 
the future 
stretching before me 
learning everything 
yet nothing I should tell 

makeup sessions 
boyfriend sneaking 
car stealing 

When ‘the Indian’ passed 
we never spoke 
of morphine 
or your fear of seeing 
her dead 

sick lips 
mediation tapes 
support groups 

How ugly I felt 
at your funeral 
no advice from you 
like I had at hers 
all alone 

Little sister 
no longer 
eldest gone 

Grief slalomed into today 
as if I’d invited the team 
unprepared 
I fell to the floor 
unclean, so seen 

screaming fear 
bleeding memories 
holding heart 

maybe today 
I can get through 
without stealing anything 
from those untouched 
by the ugly truth 

life strikes 
death waits
love
everything