Someone
Lockdown 28/28
DAY 28 – Anzac
Continue reading “Lockdown 28/28”
All to the Right
Fake it till you make it
with that tan you didn’t have yesterday
making all the fake news
and spraying it across the media
in between adverts for platform trainers
that you can’t run in
unless it’s in an election
where there are only two clowns to vote for
who make each other look good
yet no one is laughing.
Someone call the cops
in the middle of the night
and stop the circus
before the big top comes crashing down
or let’s all head to the ocean
and feel the spray for real.
© Ash Cheyne – 27 June 2019
FB and the Lighthouse
Shuffling through the warm surf towards the lighthouse
thinking of Kenya and the giggling boys
jumping into the sandy brown estuary
to cover their innocence from the sudden white man.
Trying not to remember the look on your face as I slipped that day
smacking my head on the wet boulder
hearing you shouting at me that I looked old
wiping the red trickle angrily away from my fat lip
helping myself up, the sand grinding in my teeth.
Whispering something softly to your sister’s man
in French of course in order to conceal the sting
walking into to La Mer and thinking how much I hated you then
not in any foreign language but in spite of everything
you thought I didn’t understand.
Like how all those years ago
Lydia, used to turn my bed down each night
in return for very little and the hope maybe of a big tip at the end of it all
and how she slept in a hut outside the grounds with the others
whilst we complained about the insects and the lack of ice in the gin.
Smelling sweetly despite all that, she was a pretty girl with a kid
and no real future without the likes of us who keep coming to get away
standing all day in the scorching sun
selling her wares for a fiver and a big bottle of beer.
Leaving me with something like pity and a note to say thanks
I know not for what except that I hardly knew her
but that she would have held my head I’m sure
and gently dabbed my salty cuts, like everything and nothing.
Ash Cheyne – © May 2019
Jocasta
He lays in the empty French bath
with his torn suit and dirty boots on
a rolled up cigarette hanging from his cut lip
making him wince when he tries that endearing smile of his
in the cracked shaving mirror.
Paul Kelly on vinyl hisses and jumps
the aroma from the lavender field outside the window
penetrating the stale booze and the memories
of a night that went predictably wrong
the moment he fell off the red rusty bike
trying to avoid Jocasta
and one too many shots of Dutch courage.
Bad luck in the right place at the wrong time
a word or two out of place
a punch in the face
a shotgun blasts
he pulls his jacket over his head
but it’s only to scare the birds
away from the grapes.
She sits on the ledge staring at him
like he should know better
than the last time
they crossed paths.
© Ash Cheyne 2019
