The Poetry Marathon

I see little until my eyes adjust,

a sprinkle of tiny stars not hidden

behind the heavy winter clouds,

the moon, fat and round today

shinning a gloomy green from

behind  clouds, limbs bouncing

in the wind, leaves swaying,

the glint of light of a tin roof,

possums running along the back

fence, then the wind drops and

all seems still.

-s.j.duncan-

Distance is a bridge we can never cross,

memory the only place we survive,

the hunger in your eyes, echoed by mine,

our surrender complete, then fate

dealt her hand, I remain an echo walking

through years and you dust turning to land.

-s.j.duncan-

I stand alone, in an empty room, my gaze missing,

my hunger hidden, he paints my curves with delicate

lines, my nose demanding attention, the dress dark

and wanting against my pale skin waiting to be touched by

the maid has she peels me  from this velvet concoction.

this portrait for the wall, will watch as l grow old.

-s.j.duncan-

I have watched this girl for a while now,

she is becoming more like the trees she loves

so much, every time my eyes catch her tiny

frame wondering through the bush, her skin

etched with wonder lines her hair mattered like

branches, the sun dulling her to an earthy brown

the rain leaving river beds in the country of her body,

the seas tide marks wander up her legs, salt crystals

cling to the soft down on her legs. she has become the

ebb and flow of an old memory, a spirit of land.

-s.j.duncan-

I love the walk ,along revegetated cliffs looking out

towards an ancient rocky island, I could be a thousand

miles from any where, snakes, koalas, wallabies live in

this corridor, gums and banksias keep the road hidden

but soon I come to wooden paths, stairs resting places

beautiful but not wild they disguise the great white pipeline

with flora but l see it, I taste its pollution returning from sea

it brings jobs and poison to town.

-s.j.duncan-

There is no time here in the darkness, I float watching my

home spin an endless merry go round of lights and smog,

this  body is dying sinking in upon itself, setting me free, once

I thought freedom was a rich mans luxury, now I know different,

my spirit shakes itself from its mortality, from its death and imagines

everything and knows it no longer has those desires it stretches and

it is galaxies away humanity a vague memory on its journey.

-s.j.duncan-

I wait as l have every year, candle lit, Jessie’s girl on repeat

a bottle of JACKS on the kitchen counter and an empty chair with

your name on it, an old fashioned roast in the oven, the table is

set for two, yet l stand by the window watching the rickety gate

for an older version of you to return, you went for a walk and l never left.

-s.j.duncan-

I watched as your heart broke, as love died, it was long day and a longer night,

l’d never seen you more human, more vulnerable than those moments, your hard arsed

exterior melted away, you truly loved someone more than yourself, I stayed close, as family

should a new perception growing, looking at life through a different landscape. Days became

weeks, became months, sorrow replaced by anger, by loneliness then life refilled with things to

keep your hands busy, your mind full for when you stopped, when days allowed you to think

sleep was hard to come by and you could bath in your tears,

-s.j.duncan-

I watch my fathers beautiful bride, grow an ugly disposition,

as sickness came knocking stealing his love away and its

just the two of us I feel the menace in her gaze the jealousy

in her touch the threat in her words and l run, into the world l

have never seen, into poverty and hunger looking for a home.

I hid in an empty home, exhausted I sleep only to be woken

surrounded by a roomful of noisy men, black from the mines.

Fear beat faster my heart filling my ears, I calmed they quietened

an arrangement was made, I learned to clean, to be wild, to be free.

-s.j.duncan-

it roamed the earth searching for a dream, its tongue flickered deep into the soil

flicking it into piles, growing hills, its body swam through the land

leaving crevices and gullies, to be filled with the endless tears cried by the night. its

lost scales forming mountain ranges that spaned the southern land.

-s.j.duncan-