Poetry: Poems Too Close To Home, Pamphlet

The Ladder
First Published in The Mozzie magazine, aka Micropress Oz, out of Queensland.

I looked up at Grandpa
stretched to the sky, &
I held the ladder tight.

I could smell him - and my childhood...
Windows broken by backyard cricket
giggling while he slept in his chair and growled!
Teaching me to play golf, listening
while he played me songs from
His childhood. Oh Danny Boy...
In a second I was there,
So many places at once
In so many times.

I wanted to hug him
But he was too high, so I
Held the ladder tight…


Stale Mate

He pricks her fingertip
With her consent
Her cheeks bunch up…
The seduction ends.

He supplied an alibi
For inner-office pastimes
He hardly came by
To fix the fax line…

He tuned her world
And found her girl
Became a stale mate
And stayed anyway...