meeting in the aisle

Poem: Simone and Jean Paul

I can hear the footsteps in
the square of black, of
faces poking out from bundled scarves,
ff the rotating fairground tunes
from the nutshells, of pigeons
picking up the pieces.

I have seen where they
lay, that odd pair, and it is
close. Becoming the epicentre
of their Paris, I wonder how ‘
many more giants the city
will make room for.

Cemeteries bursting with brilliance,
over there and there and ____,
the adoration of the dead, such
serious business in this city
of the serious.

The spilled blood running down the
Place de Concorde,
staining the page of what it means
to be free. I can hear them,
history, and her heavy footsteps.

If we had known her strength

Crumbs of grief
collect in your unkempt beard
my old brother, when you talk
in the hallway where Mum’s shoes trip
sleep walkers

her tea cup by the sink with the chip
at the handle, bed covers overturned
the flowers blooming in bed,
nonchalant against our loss.

Mum still smells his coffee
in the morning
though she must be dreaming
who would have thought she would dream?

my loss, our loss, pales
at dinnertime when she talks of her struggle
with knives with tea
with small talk and all that

Her olive skin matching
the brown tiles in her seventies kitchen
where she eats with her poofta sons
who play football

in the quiet, stillness of the hallway
we wait our turn to ‘be company,’
each turning over the shocking revelation
that there is nothing
so pedestrian
about loss.

Weekend reader - links I loved

This week’s links is brought to you by the holiday season. Here’s to a bit of R&R!

I love this approach to life:

The world is my museum, displaying my collections on loan. (via Something Changed)

Do you like attending your own events? Sometimes, I really don’t. This might be why.

The reason movies work so well is because they’re entertainment.  People like to be entertained.  No matter what type of event you’re holding, it’s important to realize your first job is to entertain.

It is absolutely that time of year - The Time of the List - which I love because, frankly, I love lists. Let’s start with one of my favourite Melbourne bloggers, Lisa Dempster and her list of Top Rockin’ People for 2010.

Who wouldn’t want a poetry mix tape for Christmas? - Adam Ford

Did you hear about the garment workers who died in a factory fire in Bangladesh this week? Sometimes it’s all too easy to forget that’s where our clothes come from. This is not an anti-globalisation comment, just a nudge to remember what working conditions are still like for so many.

Some futures I thought I might have by Emma Barrie struck a chord. I still dream of futures. Worryingly, they’re becoming even more obscure than Matthew Perry thinking there would be another cup.

Are these the coolest bookstores ever? (via Dan Weiss at The Rumpus)

So Jonathan Franzen went on Oprah, huh. - The Paris Review

Collaborative consumption? Yes please! - Rachel Botsman on TED

Want to know what George Orwell was doing 70 years ago to the day? The George Orwell Prize is publishing his diaries in exactly this way. 1940 was not such a good year:

He said that in the siege of Warsaw 95 per cent of the houses were damaged and about 25 per cent demolished.  All services, electricity, water, etc., broke down, and towards the end people had no defence whatever against the aeroplanes and, what was worse, the artillery.  He described people rushing out to cut bits off a horse killed by shell-fire, then being driven back by fresh shells, then rushing out again. - George Orwell.

Speaking of WWII, how are e-reader sales of Mein Kampf doing? - The Awl

A survival guide for the 26-35 age range in 2011- Thought Catalog

Be a freelancer. Because working for yourself is the American/Global Dream. In today’s economy, though, be advised that what freelancing actually means is a) abusing food stamps, unemployment and food banks, b) being a barista, c) accepting the money your parents offer and d) having one (two if you’re lucky) client(s) that result in about 15% of (what you tell others is) your monthly income.

[image: daily cartoon at New Matilda]

My top 10 blog posts of September

Too time poor to read blog posts as they happen? You’re in luck! I’ve compiled my top 10 blog posts of September in one tidy little post.

Without further ado, here’s what you liked reading most this month:

1. Banning the burqa - the debate I don’t want to debate was by far my most popular post. Which makes me happy, as I’d rank it as my most important post in the past 30 days too.

2. The new CARE Australia video was also a hit - it’s all slick n stuff. You should watch it.

3. I always suspected there were more poetry fans out there than people admit, which explains why my live-tweeting post from the Overload Poetry Festival was popular.

4. And people wanted to know why the kids are all right too.

5. My Africa is not a country series is generally popular, find out why by checking out Burkina Faso

6. Or better still, check out Burundi (which was less popular but arguably more important, so I’m bending the rules)

7. Did you see this? No, me either is worth the attention. Really.

8. People also wanted to watch Sheryl Wu Dunn’s TED talk on women and poverty, which makes me smile.

9. And apparently people are wondering what to get my for my 30th at the end of the year

10. Finally, the popularity of this post tells me my wonderful readers are probably the type who think books are an essential item and should be GST free.

Did you like something that didn’t make the list? Tell me, I’d love to know what tickled you.

[image: out in America]

Weekend reader - links, because they’re worth it

I have a picture of a very gaunt, greasy-haired Nick Cave pasted into an old journal somewhere, in recognition of my love for The Ship Song and Breathless, but this excellent article is making me question my devotion. Maybe he is just a mysoginist soandso?

The 2010 Ernie Awards for most s-xist language are out, with Tony Abbott taking out the Silver Ernie for comments like, “what the housewives of Australia need to understand as they do the ironing,” and “Are you suggesting to me that when it comes to Julia, no doesn’t mean no?”

The interwebs are full of debates about mysoginy and the bias of book reviewers to male authors. Which made me pay attention to the idea that s-xism doesn’t exist anymore, just stupidity,

In all my years of reading about it, tearing open those naughty sealed sections in magazines, watching that show about s-x with Sophie Lee from the early nineties, and everything in between, I had never come across a ‘how to’ guide for girls on losing your virginity to another girl. Until now.

I grew up here, and was sad to read my childhood stomping ground described so hopelessly:

As I rocketed along the M4 in search of a suburb so obviously bad they couldn’t even give it a colour, under an equally monotone sky, I felt sure I was doomed.

But that doesn’t mean I want to hate on rich people like this guy.

The 23rd September is Social Media for Social Good Day

Could you travel the world with no check-in baggage?

FYI, I might have to move to Denmark just so I can have a Bicycle Butler. It would only be made 100 times better if I owned this bike.

A poem called Kevin the f-cked up gold fish, how can I resist?

p.s. Like links? Here are some more.

p.p.s Paul McCartney was wrong about abattoirs and glass walls and vegetarianism…

If e.e.cummings could see me now (a.k.a. beginner’s guide to pub poetry)

Tonight I live-tweeted from a poetry event (yes, there are such things). I fronted up, pen and phone in hand for ‘Passionate Tongues,’ an open-mike night for poets at the Brunswick Hotel as part of the Overload Poetry festival in Melbourne. It was surprisingly cool!

Apologies now for the ‘text speak’ - 140 characters is hard to judge in the dark after red wine…

My tweets: 

1. @Trespassmag: twits, @lyrianfleming is tweeting for us from the Overload Poetry Festival - lets get to it
   
   
2. Open mic for #overload poetry fest starting. groovy old dudes in bright scarves & young hipsters. No, am not brave enough to put name down.
   
   
3. Tip 1 for fitting in with poetry types - wear hat indoors. Preferably a beret, but brim will do. #overload
   
   
4. Ghosts, sex, junkies & lara bingle have all featured so far.This poetry caper is cheeky, saucy & full of surprises #overload @overloadpoetry
   
   
5. sylvia plath type takes2 d stage.U can hear a pin drop-‘we dont need2fall in love, we can just cover a little distance together’. #overload
   
   
6. Distracted by the guy next2me dancing, moving hips, rockin out to an awesome spoken word about asylum seekers #notinkansasanymore #overload
   
   
7. Pub erupts w/ applause 4 a poem bout democracy, voting, & politics. Have they heard about the TRESPASS theme wk? #overload @overloadpoetry
   
   
8. Newcomers verdict on poetry in d pub thing?Bugger d hipsters, these cats r cool! *leaves w/ pen in hand, mumbling aloud in2d dark* #overload
   
   

Featured Poets: Josephine Rowe (aka Sylvia Plath type), Santo Cazzati (asylum seekers poem)

Other interests

glass of red.
eating out.
second hand bookshops.
freddo frogs.
poems.
playing the same song over and over.
laughing.
my cd collection.
pyjamas.
a feisty debate.
philosophy.
little things that make me stop and start again.
life.
maybe you.

Weekend reader - links, because they’re worth it

Penguin’s 100 books that changed the world is full of some seriously heavy (and male dominated) ideas. Yes, I want to read them all.

There once was a writer who camped out on my couch in Bangladesh during his couch-surfing journey across the world. He wrote about me in his book, which was strange. Now he’s at it again. Go tell Ben if you have done something hell-crazy, and he might do it too (and then he’ll write about it, which might be strange).

I was a latecomer to Radiohead and their genius, but here is another piece, their crowdsourced concert in Prague, available for you to download at your whim, for free. (PSFK)

Do you like mixed tapes? How about a mixed tape of tiny poetry? (Adam Ford)

Two of my worlds collide in this cool project which brings poverty alleviation to the pub. When the doors open, Shebeen Bar, I’ll be there.

If you have been under a rock, or just, you know, living, you may have missed the Jonathan Franzen frenzy. He has a new book out (which I want to read). And he has a book trailer out too in which he makes me feel uncomfortable at his profound discomfort playing out on screen at having to make such a ridiculous thing as a book trailer.

A bike obelisk you say? Why not. (The Rumpus).

p.s. Did you miss last week’s links? They’re worth it too.

p.p.s If you subscribe to my newsletter this week, you will find out a lie I discovered about the world.

Weekend reader - links, because they’re worth it

I love links leading to interesting bits and bobs around the net. It helps me tune in to the stations amongst the white noise that are zipping around the interwebs.

And because I believe in sharing love, here are my stations for the weekend:

I once went to Nice and watched the sky snow on oranges

• Do you own too much stuff? You and everything you own might help you figure that out (Mint Design)

• I didn’t know I wanted to know what a short story is, but now I know I do (Literary Minded)

Which is perhaps the first thing a short story is, it’s ambitious. Getting a narrative off the ground, up to cruising altitude, and safely back down again on such a short airfield is Top Gun hard. Short stories are the wafer thin Swiss watch of the writing world. All the mechanisms of a novel but in a triumphantly elegant package - Jon Bauer.

• This is a long but incredibly beautiful meditation on poetry, love, time, pain, and finishing the novel (The Rumpus)

Suddenly I understand that I am happy.
For months the feeling
has been coming close, stopping
for short visits, like a timid suitor.

• I want to make poetry rain, like the Chilean’s did in Berlin (The Guardian)

• On Saturday mornings, I like listening to Off the record on 3 RRR radio over the internet, it’s just the right amount of uncool, and

• I want to live where Jean Cocteau did, please (Mondoblogo)

Happy Saturday x

p.s. here’s something I know about you, you can save a life

Aiding (and abetting)

I have navigated your streets. Dipped
my shoulders and my eyes. Walked
past your outstretched hands and
twisted limbs. Ignored your call to prayer.
 
My fingers have pressed your cheeks, minimising
the amount of you on me. (These lips will
never). I shake off your calls. Your ‘aunty’,
your ‘friend’, I am (anything but). My
 
secret is out, downcast eyes (green/dull/grey)
lie, but not well. I am half hearted, (I have no h…
I am little more than a leech on the forest floor,
No, not the floor, on your thigh. And I suck
 
And I suck but you are still blinded by
the picket-fences I have for teeth, by the
milk I have for skin (mother nowhere to be fou-)
I owe you an apology, it seems.

First published by Bishaud Bangla, 2009

Mumbai

I am in Mumbai today
I was here yesterday, too
And will be here tomorrow.
I cannot see the slums from here
But their smell lingers
On my upper lip
Spoiling my food.

On standing still

And there it was
that spark long lost
caught in the rise
of my belly
in the goosebumps
on my arms
in the current
charging the air.

I lied, lied long
and hard
to your flushed cheeks
unsure of their meaning
unsure of your knees
against mine.

She loves you,
you know
I imagine myself saying
as if you didn’t know
as if I did
and excel
at keeping secrets.