cockatoo clamour
upon waking
a sulphur-creasted morning
the backyard’s old blue gum
delighted
in cockatoo clamour
its boisterous energy
devoured the dull silent air
lifted the oyster-grey sky
and like a wild orchestra
swept up the broken pieces
of my night into a new day
tokyo train
on a train
in cramped and swaying space
grey suited brief case smells
stuffy conforming silence
Speed shifts the strap i grip
feet rock in time to its rhythm
a dark blur of mean-shaped high-rise
corridor the tracks
blank faces caught
in alien worlds of electronics
outside flashing neon shout at numbness
we the night commuters
a brace of anonymity
breathe each others air
and pretend we’re not there
only my eyes out the window
beam as i glimpse the moon smiling on me
as she does on you in a distant land
soka-eki
there is nothing poetic here
a language I cannot understand
faces I cannot read
ways I do not comprehend
only the cicadas I know
yet even their stinging ring
is alien to my ear.
tokyo markets
1
jammed with strolling locals
baskets and bags knocking and nodding
bustling shoulder to shoulder
the markets absorb
and huddle the people
here it’s about the splurge of living
here life pulsates
under swaying red lanterns
a lively buzz and brackish tang
lures me
to a cool sea-wash briny world
octopus tuna and sword fish
on rock salt and ice
eyes stare blankly
lobsters tap panic-like the glass of the tank
mackerel beat their tails in a shallow dish
crabs crawl and clamour over each other
a gasping fish with throbbing gills
waits on a sacrificial wet grey-scale altar
deep guttural cries of skilled hands
in wet galoshes and plastic caps
tout their wares sharpening their knives
a willow of a boy in the corner
with kokoro and pride in his stance
chants a mantra to buy his shrimp
his shrill soprano voice
in harmony with the rhythm of the sea
catches me as water sloshes underfoot
2
vendors flaunt boxes of sweets
their chants like a rehearsed choir
blend in harmony
pasted deep red azuki beans
coloured in chestnut hydrangea blue
cherry blossom peach and grape
are jellied and displayed to allure
the pied pipers of the food markets
in coloured caps cry out oishi oishi
and woo with samples on bamboo toothpicks
from sizzling pans and hot plates
crisp aromas that waft
crowds swarm like bees to a hive
at displays of tempura teriyaki sushi and soba
each on a bed of fringed green plastic leaves
i am immersed in the chaos of humanity
and feel at home
kokoro: with heart feeling energy
oishi: delicious
azuki beans: red skinned sweet beans, basis of most japanese sweets
dispossession 3
out of sight
dry dusty shanty town
make-shift poverty
clammers on the fringe of our resort
south of lima in peru
the solid stone wall
divides us
out of sigh
but not out of mind
powerless
today a dusty sun slants sepia light
an eerie still scene of a shanty town
on the outskirts of Lima in Peru
monotone brown
ruins rubble rubbish scant vegetation
brown dusty brown
the dispossessed
in makeshift shelters
never ending palette of desolation
here on the outskirts of Lima
like a barnacled mass they cling
one night ten years ago
in india
i lay in your arms weeping for the poor
having seen the sorrow in a mother’s eyes
felt the touch of a begging hand
and i asked why
here they do not look
they turn away
a water truck comes
to refill drums
for those who can afford water
earlier it had freely watered green grass
of our resort with its luxury pool
when i walk away
i do not weep
answers would choke with dust
i don’t even know the questions
just crave your arms around me
against this inequality
black marble horsemen
with helmets medals and guns
celebrating the history of conquests
dominate santiago’s plaza des armas
yet i’m drawn by an abstract monument
catching morning light
history’s cry is its caption
without our land there is no life
its massive basalt boulders
circle like a gossip of standing stones
and mounted high
on a roughly hewn second tier
chiselled cracked and cut
as if lightening spilt the rocks
a shadowed noble face
bigger than life
its carved wistful eyes
look beyond the plaza people pigeons
to the mountain
once home of the mapuche people
around its base children play
lovers cuddle adults chatter
while first people still with indomitable spirit
bear memories of dispossession
chance encounter
my rustling disturbed his place
how long he watched
i do not know
but hopped off to a safer place
then stopped
turned
looked again
our eyes met
both stood still
two of us alone
in the bush
yearning to bridge the gap
i reached out my hand
a divide
like two pots of gold
without a rainbow
held us apart
for a moment
I breathed his fear
our eyes were held
alert . . . focused
a glint of knowing
crossed the stare
this proud grey
the hunted
knowing his place
turned
and bound away
A battle in WW1 19th July 1916.
In 2009 – mass graves began to be exhumed, remains being identified and laid to rest with honour: it brings to the fore once again a story of the worst 24 hours in Australian history, july 19th 1916.
5,533 Australian casualties in one night and with no ground taken.
fromelles 2009
time
exposes
bones
in no mans land !
stories shout
from mass graves
hell-trap stories
gallant stories
fear-filled stories
failure crawls
through fire
mud barbed wire
piteous writhing mates
drainage ditches
no respite
blinkers of youth
lure of adventure
crippled
nightmared
an emotional cry
will you not fight for land your fathers died for !
and wars roll on
deafened with enterprise
now i ask how can cycles have an end
Colleen Keating from A Call to Listen
Twice a year for just over a decade I had the privilege and exciting opportunity of working for a week at a time in Japan. I was invited by the School of Aromatherapy in Tokyo to give the Reflexology section of the Aromotherapy Diploma.
On one of my trips after the 30 hour course given over 5 days, I caught the Shinkansen, the High Speed Bullet train, to Hiroshima. I enjoyed three wonderful days and relived the sad story I read many times called Sadako and a Thousand Paper Cranes by Eleanor Coerr.
It was the time of the 65th anniversary. I headed to the Peace Park where I went each day and was there early morning on the 6th August 2010.
The photo shows Hiroshima Peace Park completed in 1954. The park contains 66 statues, monuments and buildings that stand as a symbol of the nuclear abolition and the vow of humanity to pursue peace.
!
!
hiroshima sixty-five years on
sings a song of hope
cicadas have the upper note
the coo of doves
like tenors ground the sound
cooling water trickles
and children play
incense wafts from beds of sand
people bow as they pass
coloured cranes like prayer flags
hang on trees
and memorials
today is warm balmy
i sit by the river near the epicentre
it is 8.15 am
bells
ring out across the peace park
and around the city
Colleen Keating A Call to Listen 2014 Ginninderra Press.