‘Hinterland’ Out Now

Beginner’s Luck

Painter in your linen shirt, come teach me how to see,
perfumed with fresh turpentine, imported oolong tea.
Swirl me up in yellow ochres, pigments ruddy rose.
You see what you look for and you go where no one goes.

Sailor in your schooner, come teach me how to sail.
The sky is full of ribbons and the water’s milky pale.
I’ve never seen an albatross,
or felt the tempest’s tongue.
Sail until the sailboat splinters, sail it while you’re young.

I’m never done.
I’m never done.

Gardener, come walk with me and
teach me how to grow fragrant herbs,
peonies and poppies all aglow.
Honour true persistence -- the sheer will to survive.
Every bud and blossom, seed and sapling demands life.

I’m never done.
I’m never done.

Judge, meet me in the courtroom
and teach me to decide the
honest course of action with prejudice aside.
Cloud and feather, salt and sugar,
lion’s tooth and nail weigh
heavy down on either side of your golden scales.

I’m never done.
I’m never done.
I’m never done.
I’m never done.

Borderwalker

Darling, oh darling, I’ve left for the sea.
Not sure when I’m coming back. Get on without me.
Darling, oh darling, I’ve left for the coast.
I’m off with the tide, soft as a ghost.

Couples with wine-stained teeth and wide smiles
spill out from restaurants once in a while.
Talk is so light and their clothes are in style.
That was you not so long ago,
that was you not so long ago.

The courtyards are wreathed with ivy so high.
Each ripple of laughter is met with a sigh,
the secret recluses make their goodbyes.
That was you not so long ago,
that was you not so long ago.

[ Ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen.
The local time is 11:30am. The temperature
is 52 degrees and the weather is fine.]

One without a tether, nimble as a horse,
open as camellia, prickly as gorse.
I run my own course.

Every one a fickle wasp, drowned in sugar water.
A son, a son, a son, a son.
Make way for a daughter,
someone’s daughter.

[ Will you take all your personal belongings with you
and ensure that you have all your documents with you?]

Cynic’s Song

Maybe we’ll be fossilised and married to the mud.
Maybe we’ll be burned alive or swallowed by a flood.
Maybe every tree and plant won’t give a flower bud.
Oh, maybe I should go to bed.

Maybe all the scholars have bigger, bright ideas.
Geometries, new platitudes and visions of Pangea.
A cellist down the hall plays Ave Maria.
Oh, maybe I should go to bed.

Maybe there is justice and it blows a bugle horn.
Maybe there’s a universe inside a fresh acorn.
Maybe doves of peace weren’t ravaged in the corn.
Oh, maybe I should go to bed.

Maybe if the light hits right, rain could look like pearls.
Maybe all our prayers fly from coloured flags unfurled.
Maybe all the love we have could fill the whole damn world.
Oh, maybe I should go to bed.
Oh, maybe I’ll just go to bed.

Morse Code

I’ve stung like the nettles that line the backyard
and feigned things were easy
when in fact they were hard.
Been burned before, but I hide where I’m charred.
I’m a red fox in the snow and I’ll run.

It’s rained for five days and the starlings alight
on the buddleia when it’s coming on night.
You play piano and I sit down to write.
We’re ponies in a field of barbed wire.

You,
you are alive.

I’ve weighed up the options, considered the roads
that might bring me to where I’m longing to go.
Keep treating this life like I’m cracking morse code.
I’m a field mouse in the grass, so hushed.

You,
you are alive.
You,
you are alive.

Out of Orbit

We want our Mona Lisa, we want our snowy doves,
we want to fuck in peace and we want to fall in love.
We want to know there’s meaning beyond the sky above
more than we confess, oohhh.

We want to be katrillionaires, to skate on Saturn’s rings.
We want to have a wife and kids and buy expensive things.
We want to find a leader, an arm on which to cling
more than we admit, oohhh.

Oh my god. I’m out of orbit, out of play.
Oh my god, you can fill me in some day.
I’ll be singing to the milky moon,
untethered like a bright balloon.

We want to keep our polar bears and drive our classic cars,
we want to go to Hollywood and spy on all the stars.
We want to write about it in a book of our memoirs
more than we concede, oohhh.

We want to own a piece of land and form unspoken laws,
we want to be protagonists without our tragic flaws.
We want a box filled with every piece of the jigsaw
more than we confess, oohhh.

Oh my god. I’m out of orbit, out of play.
Oh my god, you can fill me in some day.
I’ll be singing to the milky moon,
untethered like a bright balloon.

Inside/Outside

Could you tell me the name of your childhood pet? Oooo.
Have you ever had sex? Are you climbing out of debt? Oooo.

Do you want to be a man? Do you like soufflé? Oooo.
When did you realise that you’re gay? Oooo.

I’m off to where the orchards sing,
where the pears are gold and the phones don’t ring.
Way down to the honeysuckle hush.
Inside/outside.

Who ya gonna vote for this time round? Oooo.
Have you ever been the kind to sleep around? Oooo.

Who do you trust? What do you wear?
Where do you go at night?
Who do you love? Why do you care?
Oh my god.

What makes you laugh? What makes you cry?
Why do you shave your head?
Who do you love? Why do you care?
Who do you love? Why do you care?

I’m off to where the orchards sing,
where the pears are gold and the phones don’t ring.
Way down to the honeysuckle hush.
Inside/outside.

I’m off to where the word is writ,
where the caves are deep and the woods are thick.
Way down where the tide is low.
Inside/outside.

A Shárú

When anger’s a thistle with a jewel of a flower
and time is a medicine so sickly and sour,
when I am a dog with my hackles raised high,
when I look to the future with sun in my eyes,

I cannot lift
the weight alone.
I’ve spent my life
collecting stones,
collecting stones.

Rush of a punishing gale,
hold fast, oh my love.
None can tear you from me.
We have something to keep both our eyes on.

When I haven’t rehearsed every line in the play
and curl up with sorrow at the end of the day,
when I stand like an ox and stare down the man,
and resent any drift from the course that we planned,

I cannot lift
the weight alone.
I’ve spent my life
collecting stones,
collecting stones.

Rush of a punishing gale,
hold fast, oh my love.
None can tear you from me.
We have something to keep both our eyes on.

(WHITMAN’S ‘COME, SAID MY SOUL’)
“Come, said my Soul
Such verses for my Body let us write, (for we are one,)
That should I after death invisibly return,

Or, long, long hence, in other spheres,
There to some group of mates the chants resuming,
(Tallying Earth’s soil, trees, winds, tumultuous waves,)
Ever with pleas’d smiles I may keep on,
Ever and ever yet the verses owning — as, first, I here and now,
Signing for Soul and Body, set to them my name [...]”

Rush of a punishing gale,
hold fast, oh my love.
None can tear you from me.
We have something to keep both our eyes on.

Quiet Blues

I’ve read the leather books wilted yellow,
smell of musk. I’ve haunted cheap cafés
and smudged my thumb into the dusk,
but I can’t shake the quiet blues.

I’ve worn the mask of comedy and shook
the silver bells. I’ve been among the ones
I love and ended with farewells,
but I can’t quit the quiet blues.

Maybe I’ll come around. Just wait,
I’ll come around some day.

I’ve swayed like aimless wheat
under the punish of the sun. I planted
feet of clay onto the earth and tried to run,
but I can’t cease the quiet blues.

I’ve smiled like a child at prismatic
shards of light. I’ve woken in a sweat
wrapped in sheets and cold moonlight,
but I can’t shake the quiet blues.

Maybe I’ll come around. Just wait,
I’ll come around some day.

Not Today

I’m a big bull-dyke, bodhisattva, poet, wife.
Yes, I have noticed you stare.
Cut my hair, wrote a novel in Times Square.
Oh man, this is the life.

Gonna get my boots shined,
hair slick, words like dewdrops.
Gonna get my cup filled,
sweet kicks. Just like that.
Gonna get my salt-surf,
beatnik bread and butter.
Gonna get my cup filled,
sweet kicks. Just like that.

Settle for it -- not today.
Put up with it -- not today.

I’m a van dyck queer
sipping ice-cold ginger beer.
Yes, I have noticed you stare.
What a cardboard box,
what a pile of bolts and locks
is the world you live in there.

Gonna get my cup filled,
sweet kicks. Just like that.

Settle for it -- not today.
Put up with it -- not today.

UrsaMinor

You loved like a martyr and you wept like saint,
then you loaded your brush with fresh oil paint.
Called up your folks to tell them how you’ve been.
It’s a hard, old night trying to keep it all in.
You read the editorial, you take a night class.
You go to the wedding and raise up your glass.
In five years time, this’ll all be dust.
You take what you can and give what you must.

Oooooo.

Always been the the kind to keep things nice,
but the current still moves beneath new ice.
They’re skating on the river and selling mulled wine,
so you try to go out and have a good time.
You’re far enough out that the stars are on show.
You breathe real deep and smell the pine snow.
You’re exactly where you need to be.
You’re exactly where you need to be.

Oooooo.

Oh, Little Bear, with the hollow bones,
sleeping in the womb of the great unknown.
Oh, Little Bear, in the cosmic dark,
beast of benevolence, make your mark.

Tour Dates