Skip to main content

Gods are laid out / In alabaster, with horny cartilage / And zinc ribs


'73 in St Tropez Hobart docks in the springtime. Constitution Dock, October 2011.

It's like the oil crisis all over again!

Fixed Ideas, Kenneth Slessor

Ranks of electroplated cubes, dwindling to glitters,
Like the other pasture, the trigonometry of marble,
Death’s candy-bed. Stone caked on stone,
Dry pyramids and racks of iron balls.
Life is observed, a precipitate of pellets,
Or grammarians freeze it into spar,
Their rhomboids, as for instance, the finest crystal
Fixing a snowfall under glass. Gods are laid out
In alabaster, with horny cartilage
And zinc ribs; or systems of ecstasy
Baked into bricks. There is a gallery of sculpture,
Bleached bones of heroes, Gorgon masks of bushrangers;
But the quarries are of more use than this,
Filled with the rolling of huge granite dice,
Ideas and judgments: vivisection, the Baptist Church,
Good men and bad men, polygamy, birth-control . . .

Frail tinkling rush
Water-hair streaming
Prickles and glitters
Cloudy with bristles
River of thought
Swimming the pebbles—
Undo, loosen your bubbles!

Comments

Roddy said…
Not many tinnies in sight. These babies are a tad out of my reach.
Still if we pool our money????
Kris McCracken said…
We wouldn't even get a tinny.

Popular posts from this blog

Hold me now, oh hold me now, until this hour has gone around. And I'm gone on the rising tide, to face Van Dieman's Land

Theme Thursday again, and this one is rather easy. I am Tasmanian, you see, and aside from being all around general geniuses - as I have amply described previously - we are also very familiar with the concept of WATER. Tasmania is the ONLY island state of an ISLAND continent. That means, we're surrounded by WATER. That should help explain why I take so many photographs of water . Tasmania was for a long time the place where the British (an island race terrified of water) sent their poor people most vile and horrid criminals. The sort of folk who would face the stark choice of a death sentence , or transportation to the other end of the world. Their catalogue of crimes is horrifying : stealing bread assault stealing gentlemen's handkerchiefs drunken assault being poor affray ladies being overly friendly with gentlemen for money hitting people having a drink and a laugh public drunkenness being Irish Fenian terrorist activities being Catholic religious subversion. ...

Lost inside an adorable illusion and I cannot hide, I'm the one you're using, please don't push me aside, we could've made it cruising, yeah.

Yes it is Theme Thusday again, and today we are talking GLASS . I've three possible hooks to hang my [glass] hat on with this theme. First, the photo! Yes, it is the river again from an odd angle in an interesting light. You can just make out the bottom, which should tell you that I'm right on the shore. In some ways, the distortion of the stones below the surface reminds me of ye olde glass windows, what they call "cylinder blown sheet glass". You can still find some of this around Hobart these days. Thw second link comes from a trip I took to Venice a few years back. You're probably aware that Venice was (is?) a glass-making centre of excellence. If you have ever been there and taken the tour of the glass factories, you might be familiar with the sheer amount of coloured glass that sits at the bottom of the water there. These fragments of glass have been worn down and had their edges dulled by their time in the water, which makes them ample keepsakes for the ...

Happy anniversary baby, got you on my mind

No it is not a webcam, but this photograph was taken a mere forty-five ago on my way in to work. Here you can see a good old fashioned Hobart autumn morning, with the rain pelting down and me getting drenched. This one was taken on the corner of Macquarie and Elizabeth, while I was waiting for the lights to change. Come on Ampelmännchen ! Today is my wedding anniversary, an apparently I need to be showering Jen with leather -related goodies. Va-va-vaVOOM! To you Jennifer, here is a poem I wrote this very morning. Anniversary I love you i love you iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou I LOVE you I love YOU iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou I LOVE YOU iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou Happy anniversary