True life stories and a little behind the scenes

July 2013

The final Caged Without Walls post in this, the promotional first month of it's release.

          Many true life incidents are recorded in some way in Caged Without Walls. One such example, is The really important stuff.

Most of the incidents were from news stories of the time when I wrote it early September 2012. The bus crash occurred in a small town in New South Wales. The balcony incident in Sydney. Bryce Courtney had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Julia Gilliard's father died. You get the point.

The poem first appeared in the Vine Leaves Literary Journal as the very last piece in Issue 5.

The really important stuff

A young Australian man mixes

Booze

With a balcony

Doesn't make it to daybreak.

A Canadian backpacker gets lost

In south east Asia

After a bar hammering

She wanders into the wrong area

Is robbed, bashed and raped.

In a big country town

A bus collides with a small truck

It’s a school bus

Both drivers are shaken

Only

An eight year old boy is dead.

An eighty year old author has cancer

A politician’s parent is dead

A sporting star is insulted

A man is stabbed eight times

For twenty two dollars.

There’s a fashion show coming up

A franchise movie sequel is out

With that controversial star

Who had sex

Or drove a red light

Or something.

A hundred thousand people

Are affected by a new government policy

On disability allowances

Made by a half mad new premier

Who was in the right place

When the crowd grew tired

Of the last mob.

     

Fuel prices are down this week

We should take advantage.

Houses aren't selling again

Fickle market.

An elephant gives birth

In a zoo

The people go to work
And read the paper

And eagerly flip their smart screens.

No witty conclusions

Just another day.

   

C.W.W. - Behind the scenes but on the floor.

A book in progress

      
      I took this photograph as a record when I had finally worked out the poems I wanted to submit as a book and also in the order I wanted them in. It was a process of culling and being able to shift them around visually to make sure they worked with one another, and perhaps, in some way, create a flow, if not a broad narrative. I simply found it too hard to do it effectively on a computer. 

To order Caged Without Walls, please contact myself or the publisher.
Also available from Abbeys in Sydney and Readings in Melbourne. (Now available on my website).

My Books



Coming in August,

The 7 Pillars of Love.

See you then lovebirds.