By Pam Brown.
*
I have the time
to worry
every day
I check the temperature
in Taormina
on World Weather
*
‘losing my religion’
cost $2.19
I don’t know
what
I expected to pay
‘we drink to forget
the coming storm’
discounted
$1.69
*
refining the skill of peeling
small oval stickers
off the mangoes
without damaging the skins
*
I’d like
to say something now
but outside
the planes
heading off
are so noisy
I’ll wait
the eastern curlews
are leaving too
(for china –
counter-survival
land clearing)
*
slim hope –
our collapsed planet
might recover
& I need a myth
that says so
need to restore
‘normalcy’
the commentator said
*
it was awful
in the taxi
silence
a tense silence
contrived as rest
I became
an idiot
small talking
to myself
you didn’t help
*
turned on
The Velvet Doghouse
because nothing
sounded better
last time I listened
*
what did I do
to deserve this
(the women’s question)
or what did
I ever
do
optional
*
stale cigarette odour
swamps the hallway
it’s the agoraphobe
next door
puffing away
the agora can be overwhelming
even if it’s just
a supermarket
*
not ‘being conceptual’
if tv’s on
we always
watch the weather
at the end of the world news
we have a thing for it
a love affair with weather
is that boring for you
so boring
you needn’t know
so boring as to be so bent
*
you are welcome
to stop reading
this poem now
whoever you are
thanks
*
becoming light
early in the morning
becoming patchy
in the middle of the day
*
sometimes
I dread the agora too
like, panel talking
performing poems
queueing for tickets
(general admission)
everyone expectant
keen
looking ahead of them
& upwards
I don’t actually go anywhere
much
*
clear
showers easing
tomorrow, mostly sunny
sunlight on compromise
unfinished
table of contents
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Pam Brown has been active in all kinds of ventures in the multitudinous and continually shifting zone of Australian poetry and in other cultural scenes for over four decades. She has published widely and is also a contributing editor for several magazines and independent presses. Pam Brown grew up on military bases which possibly ‘explains something’. She has held a variety of day jobs but happily avoided a career in any one of them. With stints in various local and foreign cities, she has spent most of her adult life in Sydney. Her most recent book of poems, Missing up, was published by Vagabond Press in 2015.
