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ARTS AND CULTURE

Home, alone and stoned

  • 08 March 2016

 

 

My family poemMy nephew takes a one arm markthey can see it from melbourne's tallest buildingmy grandpa takes a fall and breaks his teeth and glassesmy father walks down highways lostmy sister buys little bottles of duty free perfumemy mother always worrys and it makes me sorrymy brother fights firesmy aunties are handmade teddybearsif my family ring now it will go to message bankSaturday night lightsof thunder and lightningThe rain like a baby's first stepsI'm home, alone and stoned,while the lovers are mending their bonesWho wants to be on the rubber band rebound relationshipWho wants a ride on the mothership?You are worth recovery, she saidYou're a rose tree that needs pruningYou're everything you learnt that needs learningIn the rain my heart wears gumboots.In the pain I pull the doona over my head and forget what I look like.Love like it's window shopping never interested me.I've run out of dope.This is my last ever toke of synthetic pot I hopeThere's synthetic people,but my heart drops like a coin into a homeless man's hat.The eternal night isn't very maternal.Of all those people sleeping on a concrete mattress under a black sky doona.I wish Jesus would come sooner rather than later,as the trams go past like green alligators.I catch a peak hour tram.People are ripe like juicy apples in the morning light.Business men make their bread and butter,the drugs turn good men into nutters,it's a beautiful day to suffer.The homeless have faces like empty spaces.No solution to their heads in the pollution,and their feet in the gutter.The poor gather on the banks of the flowing street.The rain hits the roof in pain,I didn't ask to be gay.The lion eats the antelope,but there's still hope.The 690 busno-one without any money on the bus.People with dreams like me,staring out the window,licking lollipop ladiesbuses are rough, but trains dance with usAt Blackburn station,women in black get on.At Box Hill ticket inspectors see if we're paying our taxes,wait to catch us.On a tram I'm sitting backwards.I'm heading to an AA meetingwith the lined faces of the old timers like lost treasure maps to help find us.Today I've got clean, pink eyes like when I get shampoo in them,and it makes me cry.Hello is the colour of a yellow sun.I'm not normal though I was born from a mother who was hormonal.A gram is the size of a postage stamp.Addiction gets under my skin, like the mark where