antimony’s due

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On my journeys through forgotten nights
I collect my dreams,
trade them for indulgences and bitcoins
with the goddess of the godless:
Antimony,
the deity of pillows,
of changing sheets, of hiding,
commander and distracter,
of games and roles,
played and yet to be.

I saw my future gracelessly,
unending worship
by any appreciative species.
But if I could travel back, rewind
the taper of reality, I’d tell myself
it’s safer not to start a thought
with if.

For my vanity, for my venial sinfulness,
a penitential tithing of my dreams
is owed to Antimony.

four reveries or so

I burn repeatedly in a dead-end street
with hyperbolic steepness.
My car won’t start and I’m not in it.

~/~

I find myself between the bushes and
the origami birds;
the sky’s old-fashioned grey,
cardboard glued with cotton wool.
Cubes are tumbling from the eucalyptus trees,
trailing dots and dashes, falling on
an infinite plane.

~/~

Before the morning’s mirror
with eyes as black as anthracite,
I see the jostle of geometry,
city crowds and flightless vectors.

Everyone knows,
everyone’s as certain as a set square,
everyone’s definitive and unafraid
to share,
but the songs we sing
we sing with kookaburras at sunrise.

~/~

I’m waiting with my mother
at a bus stop by the shores of Botany Bay.
On the steel horizon, the ships she sent
are motionless, undisputed,
her judgement not to tolerate
the slightest imperfection.

The bus arrives. I leave alone.

interest free payment plan

Antimony, the unexpected bus driver,
is uniformed sky-blue, gold buttons
unbuttoned at the top,
and imitation calfskin boots.

I pay my fare in dreams.

So you dream about me, I’m a goddess
and a bus driver…

She laughs and turns the music up.

… called Antimony in calfskin boots.
Don’t make me laugh, I have to pay attention
to the road.

She laughs harder
and lets go of the steering wheel.

about

I’m going to write a poem about every element in the periodic table. Ha ha, no I’m not. I might do rubidium on a Tuesday though.

Same old, same old: mothers, ships.

Michael Dransfield’s precis from Cassandra too: nothing is true/and so much left undone.

George McCrae (1974), Rock Your Baby.

artwork
a geometric life (detail above)

 

46 thoughts on “antimony’s due”

  1. But if I could travel back, rewind
    the taper of reality, I’d tell myself
    it’s safer not to start a thought
    with if.

    This is excellent poetry. “Taper of reality” is unexpected & the “if” business is a constant existential dilemma that plagues us all. If the detective must leave us, i’m glad he’s replaced by this, that is a fair swap i reckon.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Thanks Daniel. Sometimes I feel like reality is tapering, but suppose if I looked closely, even though I’ve lost stacks of ideas, fantasies, dreams, theories, you name it, there are new ones popping up all the time. Maybe it’s like the Shepherd musical scales that sound like they’re falling (or rising) in pitch continuously but actually don’t go anywhere. And who knows? Maybe the detective didn’t either. 😃

      Like

    • I hear you. The reason i developed a habitual process for writing is that if i didn’t I’d have this backlog of stuff to write clogging up & never move to or through or along new ideas & I’d be essentially trapped. To avoid this, process, like a Frederick Winslow Taylor production line.

      Liked by 1 person

    • Yes, it’s a good idea. I’m still trying to see Inconstant Light as “play” not “work” although I complain about never having time to do it. Thing is, for me, work is say monitoring welding robots on the production line at the GM Elizabeth plant. So to see Inconstant as fun/hobby/playtime, it’s all random, and I have bits and pieces of everything everywhere. 🤡

      Liked by 1 person

    • Thanks Gina. Antimony is definitely a chameleon. There are dreams and actual reality in there, not that it’s easy to tell them apart. I think of dreams as starting of as finely chopped memories (ie reality) that get reinterpreted at some level of our consciousness. Memories/reality used directly are less finely chopped, more sliced and diced. But dreams become memories as well and make more dreams, the wheel of dreams I wrote about somewhere. So in the end who knows what is what or which occupation came first. I like to think she started as a bus driver though. 🚌

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    • I have to say your theory of dreams being finely chopped memories intrigue me. Since our last chat about dreams and about me almost never dreaming I have actually had 2 very vivid dreams of my late son. In both dreams he is as I have remembered him, doing something I am sure we have done together before. the familiarity of it was very unsettling and yet it sent me a positive message each time. She must have been a very enigmatic bus driver to elevate to a higher status!

      Liked by 1 person

    • I should have explained a bit more clearly, Gina, sorry. I think you would rarely notice the chopped pieces unless you were woken suddenly, and then they are, to me, like flashes. I understand that normally another part of the subconscious “bakes” them into something more coherent: the dreams we remember. Yes, for me, such dreams are a blessing. After my father passed, in my dreams he stood in the rain outside my window, and somehow it warmed my heart.

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    • thank you for clarifying Steve, my dreams were very brief almost a flash, I wake up too often at night to dream longer. Your explanation made a lot of sense and most of I appreciate you sharing about yours of your dad. I felt the strange comfort too, almost tangible.

      Liked by 1 person

  4. Beautiful! You MUST write about each element! Well, at least the interesting ones! I once wrote 22 sonnets about the tarot’s Major Arcana and it adds a little structure to life. Of course, haven’t written one since. Anyway, great digital art and words, as always. See, I came out of hiding to comment! 😀

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Hey Clarissa, thanks so much and I’m flattered that you commented, I’m glowing like plutonium. 😜 Mmmm maybe I could do the interesting ones. Caesium qualifies, it can’t be carried on passenger airplanes because it catches fire/explodes etc on contact with air, and it once started a fire in my lab.

      Just had a read and reread under the tarot category at your site, some of the cards are there (I think), good stuff.😃

      Liked by 1 person

  6. Beautiful poetry! Outstanding! Poetry to return to!
    But i wish you hadn’t mentioned writing a poem about every element in the periodic table, because now I’m thinking..hey, that’s not a bad idea.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  7. Where to begin. It’s so rich. The goddess of the godless. Venial sinfulness. Indulgences. As a former Catholic, that thread hits home. The songs we sing we sing with kookaburras at sunrise. Exquisite. My car won’t start and I’m not in it… Reading your stuff is like a recognition of things forgotten, or put away. It’s uniquely your experience and yet it’s everyone’s. Namaste.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • 🙏 As always very grateful for your comments BG. Without too much detail, for various … reasons, 😃 I did pick up quite a bit of knowledge in my years spent in predominantly Catholic South America. At the same time, I found belief there to be the polar opposite of strict, raising a question about reconciling religion and human nature, what it is to be human. Okay I think I’ve said enough. 😄

      And thank you for those poetic words, they would be great commentary in my imaginary book.

      Liked by 1 person

  8. What great joy it is to be back in your world of words. This past month I have felt as if my body was the spaceship of cold viruses. I have missed this world of yours. Today I shall sit in the cockpit and make my way back in time so I may catch up with your adventurous mind. Keep doing what you’re doing, It’s working :).

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Great to have you back too, Tamaya. 💚 Sorry to hear about your “spaceship.” Here the weather has been excessively hot, over 40C on quite a few days, and I decided to have a break from inconstantlight for several weeks of family events and so on.

      Thank you, Tamaya. If this site can defeat viruses. I will have to bottle it and sell it. 😃

      Liked by 1 person

    • hahah that is funny. they do have a mind of their own you know. My laptop has not requested a name but my little car has, right from the moment I sat behind her wheel. Aveline is her name and she has rooster co-pilot named Kerouac, occasionally his twin sister Sylvia comes along for a ride.
      Its a wonder I have not been institutionalized hehehe. Have a good day 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  10. Intriguing poem, fascinating imagery. Reminds me of a David Lynch film. I like the way you re-work your dreams. My favourite part is
    “Everyone knows,
    everyone’s as certain as a set square,
    everyone’s definitive and unafraid
    to share,
    but the songs we sing
    we sing with kookaburras at sunrise.”

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • David Lynch. I’m flattered. I suspect there’s a liminal land between reality and dreaming, between awake and asleep. I’m afraid I spend a bit too much time there. 😜

      Thanks for mentioning that verse, Nikita. To me, the world is mostly like that. I’m amazed at how much we think we know.

      Liked by 1 person

  11. I really love the way I can be seriously pondering what you have written and its imagery one moment, to laughing myself silly the next…”imitation calfskin boots” got me too, among other things…like cars you aren’t in that aren’t starting…and the intriguing threads…
    Than I clicked on “Rock your Baby” and I am still chuckling.
    I am curious what brand of coffee you drink? 😉

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • PS my friend’s step grandson told us that the “kooka brothers” were in his tree the other day. He’s four. Adorable. Couldn’t help thinking of it, I am pretty sure he would have tried to sing with them.

      Liked by 1 person

    • Thanks Vanessa. Haha, love the seventies. I’m capsule at home and it used to be Nespresso. I’d go into the store at Bondi and buy from the salespeople in their gorgeous dark suits. Then I thought “I’m paying for those suits.” 😄 Now it’s Vittoria from the supermarket, and it’s better because the capsules have little packets and when you open them you smell the coffee beans. I need another coffee. 😃

      Liked by 1 person

    • haha gosh, the seventies…
      I am capsule too…I decided to go against the tide and never got a nespresso…I did get a Lavazza A modo Mio a few years ago, and it’s still going, I love it.
      Unfortunately, (or fortunately, depending on who is on the receiving end of my crazy) I have had to go more decaf for my health.

      Liked by 1 person

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