Far/Close Dover Beach (after Arnold)

I attempted to write a poem in rhyming couplets…

… I

Got

Bored

Forest Creek is the nearest water source to me

But like all water sources it runs to the sea

It runs into the bay where both parents lie in ash mixed with brine

& that to the oceans that gather the past future present in Time

It still seems incongruous that ignorant armies continue to war

But attack & defense aim at a different score

Anyway, Matthew I also hear what Sophocles heard

But I need to break from couplets for all I hear is dissonance

& there is no regular rhythm for a world undone

I hear a break from nature now that the world across

Bases its peace on drones bombing high & low

That won’t be ordered into the oceans’ ebb & flow

Poetry feels like a parlour game I am deaf & dum

More likely great oceans we rush & lurch

& I am as late on the scene as a Central silver birch

It’s different now storms have been eclipsed

By weapon fire & bombed hospitals for Mammon’s bitch

Corporations run foreign rapes it is no affair

Governments are important & democracy’s coffers bare

As the 3^rd & the 1^st worlds begin to look alike

The bourgeoisie lycra over Forest Creek on a $20,000 bike

Mel From Melbourne - Music & Words