Barnaby Smith


corridor of dead bandicoots

children
in the front
paddock come
to know the hour
as five
more minutes

visiting the MacLarens
or whoever
on Kings Road
while
adults oddly talk

bad visibility
so you
catch the ball
with cherished seconds
from car lights

4WDs moving
between dinners
among muzzled
beings
becoming mulch

how can they
reconstitute
as landscape
with such sneering
toothy
grimace

hypnotising
us when the footy
goes on the
road


Ballast

greeny is gay

rednecks are assholes
licks                assholes dry

not as much as green

the dune rat
the thieving dog

[A found poem (at eye-level, public toilets, Uralla)]

Barnaby Smith is a poet, journalist and musician currently living on Bundjalung land. His poetry has appeared in Cordite, Southerly, FourW, Best Australian Poems, Australian Poetry Anthology, Meniscus, Otoliths and others. His arts and music criticism has appeared in or at Rolling Stone, the Guardian, Australian Book Review, The Quietus and others, and he records music as Brigadoon.
 
 
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