Cover

CLUNG

Title Page

Dedication

For Vic,
Jerry, Ella, India & Angelo

Acknowledgements

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Some of these poems have appeared in Sport, Landfall, NZ Listener, Best NZ Poems 2002, Trout, ‘Wellington – a city in Literature’, Mercury Lane 2 - Episode 1, and on National Radio.

The Violet Durn in Amnesia, Lake Detox & the Great Spoilt walked straight out of the totally cool book feed by M. T. Anderson.

All hobby roads lead to hobby city is a radio by-line used to advertise the shop Hobby City.

I am enormously grateful to Gary Waldrom whose painting has been detailed for the cover of this book.

And most especially thank you to the presenters and news presenters from National Radio whose names appear in these poems.

Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Acknowledgements

1

Clung

1YA

how to fix a radio

denniston according to gary on the radio

midday report

gameshow in kandahar

Love is no Bus

radiohead

shot

wires

plateau honey

llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch

anchor me

2

Glory To The Trees

and-yellow

angelo victor ~ nicola wright

believing your liver is rich

Bob

woke

virtual beach

explorers

clint eastwood - Poot!

happy birthday shark!

Nurnberg

New York

spanishing

in Tallboy

teeth – 2002

3

beresford street

grahams beach, bach

float

pink roe

a tank of snow

the sun in relation to the left & right eyes.

aorta

nineteen dollar trap – mitre 10

western springs zoo

is it good to hum, river?

the sopranos

yeah

Amnesia, Lake Detox & the Great Spoilt

weaner

Copyright

1

The story of drowning
for flounder came to my radio every hour

Clung

It was a balloon day.

& at sea clung the girl

to the looseness of water.

*

From the rescue helicopter

the ocean was a drop.

*

The story of drowning

for flounder came to my radio

every hour.

1YA

you get the radio on

& hear the bird of the day

which sounds like any other

whistle being fed into the 9

o’clock beeps with news

*

you know wellington is there somewhere

forming some sort of front.

*

there is a red light on the transistor

you got from the dick smith store

*

you are connected

by a tuner

*

from the volume you will come to know

all those people going about

their steps up up

into their warm lives

to stay put from the wind

which is for sure a hurtler.

*

you will come to believe

that wellington lies inside a radio

& bleak is on a m

*

there will be much talk about

who the weather is heading for

& how wellington is forgot

of the sun.

*

& you will remember vic’s uncle pat

of petone

& the smell of his hands

in the wet flatette

& how his loose phlegm cough

broke free of itself

on the carpet by your feet

*

you can turn wellington

off with your thumb.

*

how to fix a radio

your radio is your talking

world & your baby is your

world crawling into walls.

holding your radio

your baby heads for

the surface hardest to

fall

the pasifika wall

who has only one coat.

there are marks to prove

how hard his throw is.

you say see this is the tip

of mexico jutting

that is the size of greece

the news of the world

which was on & going

& once with an aerial

where an aerial should be ~

is now

your world down

your radio sellotaped

& arnica with your baby.

denniston according to gary on the radio

this will be a story for you about denniston

where a woman will sit on a hill for 20 years

leaving nothing but cakes behind & a fear of the incline.

*

you will learn about bivouacs & inclement times

& the frailty of defrosting whitebait whose eyes

are lovebeads. & why 50 bucks a k is steep to eat.

*

you will hear a man say about his first trip.

going underground in a highschool bus

to see the earthenware tilt to see the world

from the inside.

*

on nine to noon

you will have spooned into your one working ear

the man say the shape of the feeling i have in my heart

& want to cry at the amount of falcon & live kiwi in his

toddling bush off the bluff.

*

when you read this you will see why people live in groups

of smiles hooked to the same telephone by the same surname

by the same wire.

*

you will sense the bottle of Sunlight he uses for the dish

& plate & cup is similar to yours.

you will know that mountain by the sound of inclement times & by people

whose lives are lived in the 9 clouds.

midday report

a man & a man are in a small car

with a map of names. there is a 2b by faber.

a radio of waves is what they have.

*

they are sitting listening to a midday report

& wait to see where the news will

land them.

a man & a man off the coast.com

*

they hear the value of money

euro down. & the cost of playstation double.

they hear about tourists

losing their nike ticks at the disco.

*

in the small car there is a map of names.

a geographic of hotspots.

bb26 j-j 3

is a goner.

*

they have bread.

i said they have bread.

a man & a man in a small car with a baguette

from the bread is flying shop.

*

in a small car with no badges

no name no gt v6 or g l e

are a man & a man.

*

this is the season

of stars & frights.

there is talk of people

running with short breaths

all over the place.

*

off the platform & over the tracks.

through universal studios

using all the prepositions possible.

*

here is the epitome of badluck.

a man & a man in a small car with low euro

a flat battery & Bad Prospects.

gameshow in kandahar

he was a different language from the start.

there were times when he knew

about the world like the shape of running honey

or the many uses of penicillin

when you can get it.

his life was a clock of times on the bbc

this time in london

that time in kandahar

he was a war reuter

& knew the sound of mortar & rubble

heart for heart

he was middle east & a west vegas

& today he was a gameshow king

winning the 2 litre of olive oil

which is what you win if you can’t get

the car

Love is no Bus

this is grahams beach

where i don’t get tv

or phone

i am no lone star.

*

a couple chisel away

at oyster ~

this rocks she says.

*

our dog collapses

from too much swimming & shitting.

*

the tranny works only just ~

love is no bus in palestine

on the ten o’clock bulletin.

radiohead

pre bed

our ritual of teeth washing & flossing is habitual

& we empty our bladders the same all over the world

~

we sleep with a radio at the tip of our heads

for our ears to swan on the sound of foreign news

& a round up of the day here

~

we are radioheads

flitting in & out of other people’s countries

~

sometimes we take the radio stories

& slip them into the beginning of our dreams

with close shaves & steering wheel terrors

~

or the brush with.

~

in a very bad night there will be extended coverage

& much bbc & abc stuff.

shot

here is the snapshot. this is the paris herald

that is the road in the colour nullabor.

*

he is a warjunkie with a thing for

shutters apertures & caption thinking.

*

always shooting up large

& in & out of the home dark room

where you see what you shot.

*

i believe in tunnelvision & unity books

& 2 batteries makes a radio rule.

*

he faxed me

from the hotel where the aircon was off.

& the roomservice cost the earth in nasdaqs.

*

j’like this?

a breeze outdooors – a shagged journo.

watches cellphones & laptops that fit

into your boxers.

*

it’s my last marmite.

checkout the guy in the flannel suit.

*

a tailor

who i got having his last breath.

*

jonny dymond jonny dymond

where are you?

*

wires

Here is the radio from the inside out with mechanics.

Who brings me stories of accents lost from nations

whose nationals don’t vote.

Where a roadmap is spin for not sure.

These are the valves of ceos verging on perjury.

& those are the wires of pharmac & farmers

whose codes trick.

Beef is an infection.

& war is a 30 second commercial

made in the Philippines from fingers of kids.

These are the times when buying

is Branding & Dreaming is paying or not.

With Nero burning Rom off.

& that is the tube who passes the story

to the heart of my ear. From Radiowood.

With the lure of Free True News.

plateau honey

is a sign

on the way

through the north island

where all the towns

come at you

in fog.

through the windscreen

of your eye

& lobe

where everything is

absorbed to your chest

& your heart is a little

mtv singing r e m

& you swallow all the

busted country fencing

like a western

with the plethora of bps

caltexes & as much

cattle

as you can

handle

*

you hve time to

think about the brevity

of text messaging

& where the next doughy

piece of c4

will go off

& whose country will

it pock on.

*

when the westfield jingle

comes up

& you hear about

the 700 shops under

one rooftop

you spot yourself slammed

at a counter

asking jane supervisor

where do i find

housewares.

llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch

it’s like this.

you are after 9 & before midday.

you are halfway ~

& in your yard there is the ball sun.

around the world is july

& today your neighbour has

up for the first time a sky dish.

*

you hear trevor call linda

with a place name too long

to get down.

& beginning with a double L.

*

so you make a search for trevor

& the welsh town in english.

*

saint mary’s church

in the hollow of the white hazel

near to the rapid whirlpool

of saint tysilio of the red cave

*

you thank trevor & measure

the welsh at 12cm

anchor me

i go to my house slowly

& eat softly

the radio in my room

dreams me the news of al jazeera

*

i dig up all the stories about

war & sorties

& count dots & crosses for

a queen’s birthday roadtoll

what a swell present

*

i incubate you a joke through

the woods

a ha ha from me in the trees

here is my homepage ~

anchor me.

*

hold onto your helmet

your explorer your SUV

your i d your whereabouts

2

With our atlas of rivers & mountains & rocky roads
in the stony days of the long sounds

Glory To The Trees

You are stopped on the shocks

of your new tyres. To your left

is the lonely hall of St Michael

of All Angels. Who is open & cold

for aerobics. Whose bell’s tongue

does not ring nor

gong. Whose slack geranium

you did not get the colour of.

Where Crewcut your lawn crowd work

even in simple rain. Falling on the slant.

You have missed the dog by mls.

Epiphanies you hear your mouth say

& Glory to the trees – today dog –

you are one lucky sucker.

and-yellow

you realise there is no hope

left for teachers when in the

school newsletter it says

we welcome nichola poor

& look forward to working her.

you want there to be no more bell.

you begin to wish for pills for

your children instead of

lunch from a plastic décor box.

you wonder why their paintings

contain less & less

you begin to sound things out

stretching the oh’s ~

vowels start to look like

phone numbers

3 o’clock looks like a wedge of cake

you are rushing to finish

oh there you are tui

by dinah hawken

& then you hear

ella say:

and-yellow and-yellow and jello

angelo.

& he is

our number 4.

angelo victor ~ nicola wright

the epicentre of an SUV is the heart of the matter.

& this is the story of the weaning

of angelo victor.

*

the radio had gone down.

a chinook was coming into tikrit on its wing & tank

they were both coming to a head.

*

I sat lip reading the news.

*

the weather was a tangling mess with the middle east.

*

we were in the cheap season of strawberries.

*

I could thread my breast into the mouth of a million

sons but only having one was lucky enough.

for my breast.

*

when a chinook is about to fall

you see your son in pumpkin patch

& treasures in clarity

as if he were washed in rainlets.

*

some blonde chic was picking off her kids

from the school gateway ~ the green forest

SUV pumped in idle.

*

one day you’re gonna wake to a day that’s not there

& goodnite oil.

*

I had spoke to my radio

Radio I said

tell me the one about ali baba

& his little wee lamp.

*

somedays are about petrol & mana news.

it’s surprising how long it takes to drain yourself fully.

*

& somedays just fly.

still. a chinook

comes to rest on the sand of trouble.

*

all day this is Friday.

& one mother is off to get her one kid

in her ford e f explorer

with her wheels on the curb

& the knockout blink of the hazards.

*

I fed angelo victor his nearly last breast

with 18 pearl teeth

to the hopping of the chinook from my radio.

*

& then into the mouth of

this morning I nicola wright.

thank you I love your tone.

*

& the streaming

of where the world is at.

a chinook & a missile hang out.

*

& this is the only time you will say

your radio was making a mess of the day.

believing your liver is rich

You are under no illusion.

You are the fever at 40 degrees

C.

From off of the ceiling in your bedroom

are the plastic stars who fluoresce.

Today you thumb no to soup from the duvet.

You are the radio in wishing dreams.

You are the News & the Weather.

& Mary Kisler & Stanley Spencer.

You are the line –

Heaven in Cookham.

You are Nicola Wright & the Central Plateau.

You were Sean Plunket for his name alone.

You are snow lowering one minute.

& tropic the next.

Really – you are all over the heart & agog.

Trying to locate your liver

who is rich & intricate

with all the drugs a virus can eat.

Bob

Bob is a Day Job.

He was a quote just the same.

*

His number & the price of labour

was the square root of any fat digit

you can think of.

*

Have you ever noticed

how people will give you their fax just like that.

Hi i am Bob – Fax. Your Tree is seventy in cambium. Call me.

*

Bob of the cardiac address.

Bob of the radio the size of a small truck

with enough decibels to fill your street.

Bob off the station – you know all scratchy.

*

Bob in recap took our tree by lunch down –

which is quick if you’re the counting sort.

& all the birds looking for their night home gone.

*

woke

Time is white

& the baby came in a new season

but you could say that about all of them ~ ours

*

i looped them over the undoing of our street

all born in a house 2 here 2 there

i worked them into the dawn awake

*

firstly we slept zero

with the smell of milk

& our babies –

& the rigmarole of wrapping & the unwrapping of them

*

we signed our roundy names on the Certificate

of Authenticity crossing to the townhall

with its full clock ~ meat pie in each hand

*

we drove to every beach when they would not sleep

with our atlas of rivers & mountains & rocky roads

in the stony days of long sounds.

*

twice in one week i smacked the front out of 2 cars

*

at one beach

the size of latitude was light ~ longitude quiet

i slept myself. my babies ears to the shore on lull & hush.

*

today ella says matt

knows what sea means in maths –

back then it was roundabout an hour.

*

virtual beach

inside the baby is feeding.

& you are useless at weaning.

*

so you sit with your lonely ear

to the busy cities

of tv.

*

you are a circle

& your baby an o

*

you receive the news

about a beach with no sand

which is about all you’re up to.

*

you hear people rhyme

beach & reef

jetties & amenities in the same sentence

*

& you see the engineers

who had designs

in their eyes

*

you meet golden bay

& oriental parade

in 2 frames

*

& wonder how far sand travels

to make people happy & your baby –

he will never know from where that sand came.

explorers

to be an explorer

you would start behind your nearest school

& you would explore around an area where

you hadn’t been before

*

you would call that

the beginning of your exploration

& you would table it.

the school would be a metaphor

for what you never saw while you were there.

*

you would find

things that hadn’t been uprooted before or noticed

& you would imagine that behind the school was

the beginning

*

then you would go behind that.

& you would look behind what you

were just looking at & turning over.

you would need to take lots of steps

to distance yourself.

*

you would repeat the process

so you would all the time be going behind things.

& looking at the back of them

*

people would say

oh she is just exploring behind there

she is trying to get to the back of everything.

*

& you would be taking steps

to see behind the last thing you just saw

*

in this way you would be a True Explorer.

& if you kept going at it

you could say you were

seeing round the back of whole countries

& that you had come from a school

whose name you didn’t get down

because you were too busy looking round the back.

*

& people would not so much be interested

in the fact that you were a true explorer of

the back of things

but that you didn’t record where you started.

& that you hadn’t noticed

the very front.

clint eastwood - Poot!

i dialogue with jim

over a back fence the colour of pantene & aquatica.

he tells me how to cover grapes

so the blackbirds won’t swell on them.

i tell him about my ella who is drawing

a graveyard of shipwrecks in pencil.

he tells me about stencilling in wanganui

& how you can wipe out a whole town

with a can of spray.          like this pffffffft.

he says in the latest listener april 5 page 55

which are great numbers don’t you think ~

there is a fine example of

a clint eastwood honking forward

with a gun going Poot!

he says Poot! would make a great shot.

get this. if you are looking for the article it’s by

neil young.

for real.

happy birthday shark!

arriving in the scribbly raindrops

we have a parcel from melbourne

of one revolving dolphin lamp.

*

we are warned in serif

of the dangers our lamp can bring.

*

the shocks we may get

if the power is on

& a hum is heard on the left side.

*

the lamp is round

*

there are also times we may need

to ignore the sound of the

happy birthday shark!

*

we are pleased we have options

on this day who rains & pours.

Nurnberg

from germany

the postcard

of castles arrives.

*

in the last days

it was 36 degrees

you miss the celsius.

*

we do a lot

of swimming in the

fountains.

*

we are cooked

of august

& the smallest

she is sick.

New York

We are home

to wellington

*

our cases of

life have not

arrived

*

we are without

christmas

*

& all about us

people karori

& hutt & petone

*

if only

spanishing

we supermercado

for avocado ~

no joke.

*

instead we end

up with money

chocolate from france

*

& how we sing

the ode to aioli ~

our new discovery

in Tallboy

i tell my grandmother

who knew about plane flying

we are heading for the ponsonby

offramp. she tells me we are heading for

zemon which sounds like lemon

& that the americans will drop blankets & propaganda soon

& cigarettes if you are lucky.

i tell her about tv & advertising

& that it is best not to look

she says surely we must be close to the zemon

airport by now & how she must give blood

for money & bread

i tell her about calm things

like dolphins in the lemonadey

sea below doing their dorsal stuff

& how to make a safe lane change

in an import

from her wet nappy she asks me

where is the west

from the car

& what are we doing on the bridge.

in a newspaper cut out

that she kept in Tallboy

along with Seiko Watch there is her

standing beside a plane wing & a big number

like 01 say

with mask & earflaps.

boots also.

teeth – 2002

i am barefoot in the small room       with yellow windows

from the sun        through the glass is a hedge which is really

like a wall

*

my grandmother is resting her thorax & the skin on her hands.

you would not want to take a photograph of us.

i am working on her teeth & notice the gums to be paler

which is also a colour.

*

the stain of brown will have to stay

i am over the handbasin which says

vitreous china & when you drop the teeth

they sound tinny. i have a big head toothbrush.

*

a calculation of how much she smoked

turns up 2 million one hundred seventeen thousand

which sounds like a number from google.com

*

there is a picture of her & my mother

with cigarettes poking from their nose

chainsmokers it was called.

*

in the 70s false teeth were popular.

*

3

All hobby roads
lead to hobby city

beresford street

i am in my street

with a junket for this ambulance

parked up on a lawn

*

the red cross truck

in quick brown fox

*

i am asking which police officer

what happened

& for all gory to see

he smiles a killeen winner

*

a gun & a foot

& we are looking for the reason

he says.

*

i am a slow volvo

pulling away

aware of the

2 foot driving rule

*

i am a rubbernecker –

a chiropractor’s

dream swivelling at 40

bucks a pop

*

details are sketchy –

breeze

& sun & a cheap letterbox

are dead certs.

*

my diction is quick

when i ask a photographer

from the Little Local

how close did you get

*

close enough he says

to see only one foot

attached

& a knob of swaddling

left.

*

he says it was about

the other guy’s julie

& how she be going from

foot to foot

up 2 garden paths

of 2 marines.

*

which is why you would

want to shoot the other guy’s foot out

grahams beach, bach

this kiss we take

is made for our hips

we salmon on in to each other’s clocks

with a light switch on string

you pull from the ceiling

*

& here we are arriving

at the sugar of our lives

*

our children sleeping in their

weeny duvet skins ~

kina & creamery

*

what price would you pay

& from which shop

*

the sea out front

is a font in italic –

the forward curl

*

we think how lucky we are

on the peninsula.

*

float

Here is a day for water. Of the wet

morning & all day long. Our concrete

path she floods. We woke to lakes.

Up in our roof where we sleep

drops fall.

The legend of the crying windows.

We escape to no part of the house.

To our rainy traffic – hullo.

Over a long time inside the world

floated us out.

pink roe

i happened to say to them i was in deep love

with flounder & the way they have their eyes

so close

for breakfast i could eat one each day of my life

& goodluck is the pink roe

*

so with an underwaterlight

& spear they aimed at shadowy things for me

the stingray with a decent wingspan

lived on & rocks took a hammering

*

breathing in the morning at my face

with its doctor hauschka toner on

he said

we were all-stars lastnight

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