Competition

A Handful of His September
by Jonathan Lo
The Southport School, Southport, Qld

A handful more of meek.September,
Blessings of the proud cockerel
Unmasked whisperings - danced to match the rhythm of the campfires and chimney smoke,
Flashing red breasts high-fed on corn.
City lights in l ast night’s fire,
Cheap stones in second-rate stores,
Stray one marks his in the memory of the day before,
And a city in the smoke is wished away - into the aimless kingdom of the clouds.

Netted notches in the secret twilight
As the fisherman mates his last inspection,
Light fresh and crisp up on the air,
His first catch of the day.

Into the sun-bath swims this valley,
Of wind whisperings in ears of corn,
And the sun swirl dampens into mid-noon lustre
- And the morning breath makes a last inspection.

Swathing flocks of June Enterprises
Come the Anthology of poems from many walks of life,
Hustling down one street or two, in the light of morn,
And for awhile they are all on the same walk, on the same way to life.

Muddy light in muddy puddles,
No more confused than the grass-blade in winter;
Hard-drawn into a knotted bundle about the descending howl,
When all is silent and all is full - and the seed is split for the winter rein.

Windmills make their midday talks
With the busy wind,
And closer to heaven lie the clear springs
Where the bodies of the earth come to battle.

The thunderous cries of the red-breasted general
Open up barrages on the front-line of his sphere,
And for the day, at its prime, so is he ,

And he is served what is his – nothing less, by the mock servants of his mock domain.

Evening marks the afternoon bustle,
A match is fit to the overhead canopy,
And the winds descend once more
To take a toll on the weak and weary.

The man with Shakespeare eyes and city limbs is back to speak of iron wood, Looks for the coat-rack, finds none,
But the Shakespeare eyes remain the theatre for night-time tales,
And for all those who look for it, find one.

And in the night of the evening bonfire,
They who sit in knotted silence,
The man is served last night's stew
Of yesterday's king of yesterday's domain.

Says he: “City limbs mark the lantern waste
Ad carriages have no horses,
Food -freshly plucked - always in a box
And the springs are filled only when you want to bathe. "

"Continues he: City trees all set in stone,
And haze and smoke and" choking winds,
A Jungle that is slowly burming, yet never burns,
'With many people living in one tree."

"Marketplaces have no set paces,
And traders deal in figures and paper;
And when night is day in the never dark,
And when the many moons make midday lustre."

Every word and every thought,
From this man henceforth departed.
Be held fast in the fortress of many,
In the round-tower of the heart.

The fire – hitched high upon the long-delayed cold
Is slowly burning,
As are the tales of the man with Shakespeare eyes,
And don’t forget – city limbs.

Then, as soft-felt as they had come,
The tales are done in no spectacular finale,
And whilst the multitude thread the ways to their walks of life,
It is the night that steals the city in the fire – now a city in the smoke.

Villagers jump the moon-puddles
Craters in a vast Auditorium
The stork delivers the child of night,
And for all those to whom this seed is implanted – it is time.

Another day, Another sunrise,
Another birth, another marriage,
Another death, another sorrow,
Another way, another tomorrow.

But of the city man–
Where is he?
His travelling staff and travelling bags – where are they too?
Gone to the horizon beyond the horizon – no doubt – for another handful of his September.