Mel From Melbourne - Music & Words

  Mouth, & things related to the mouth   I seem to spend an inordinate Just wanted to use that word Would a helluva lot work better? Shouldn’t I try for as wide a potential audience as possible? Don’t get me wrong I’m under no illusions that many will read or hear But yunno, not to isolate; rather to invite people IN   What was I talking about again? It’s not really relevant is it? You only want to know who I am Or rather what I am A unique event Reduced to an object from a collective said object   Of course, you doubtless think I’m beating around the bush Anyone would say that I know I would, in fact, I am outright saying it   All I really wanted to say was that I cringe A LOT these days At old foot in mouths committed over the years They behave like a lowlight reel on a loop Embarrassing moments from my youth The older I get Rather, I wish I could occupy my psyche with new and interesting things & not just rehashing sh#t But yunno, not much happens whe...

Why write?  People aren’t cut out for reading. They’re incapable of joining the dots, except for the few destined for the madhouse. It’s tedious. Everyone’s talking politics, they call it. Sounds more like gossip to me. It’s crowding out articulate voices with animal noises and photoshopped faces. You can’t teach about genocide via a movie. Movies are exterior. Suffering is interior. You can’t do justice to a genocide by focusing on the perpetrators and leaving the victims silent. Then you are perpetuating it. JoJo Rabbit is a tragically mistaken work. It provides little but a sympathetic Nazi and anti-Semitic ear worm taunts. I once wrote a poem using the n-word. Born from a life experience where it was embedded and recollected in the poem. I spent years editing and footnoting all trying to make it work, until finally I realized it was inherently flawed. I guess Hollywood rewards people who put entertainment and their artistic egos above morality. Most famous artists are unwise. E...

  The Beatles were so right about our materialist, individualist world – “You don’t see me” & I don’t see you   & this causes so much frustration Which easily heats to anger –   We don’t see one another, Because essentially One cannot be perceived –   One appears to another through a series of masks & mirrors   & today Most people we see Appear via screens Rarely presenting themselves Other than in the capacity of a functionary   What I’m saying also Is that you don’t hear me & I don’t hear you –   Were it ever possible to It would be impossible Using the today’s language of Commerce & politicking & power, To attempt intimacy   I say something I think is beautiful & I wish to share the beauty I feel with you   But a word catches You don’t like that word All you see is that word That becomes the focus –   The signifier Not the s...

(a space in Jells Park 11/12/2021, Wurundjeri Woi Worrong & Bunurong country) From my limited experience, it seems to me that the great writers are invariably fairly pale kinds of people. The great spirits are dialogists & enablers who would rather live than write. People like yourself. I was suggested to run a poetry picnic in Jells Park the other day & in the process realised that my poems in writing are fairly b grade, which was initially disappointing, But I did rip out a pretty cool improv on guitar which spoke to, of, with & for the occasion. Above all I preferred the collaborative nature of the day, with EVERYBODY SHARING than the usual stage delineation between performer and audience. The birds, animals, trees, water, sky & earth participated too, the spirits who were acknowledged and present. There were some beautiful words read, recited and spoken, where written texts, borrowed texts and the conversational, the sung blended into one patc...

The ancient Chinese were right to tie knots in string rather than write words. Nowadays we type words in some standardised font even further separated from the making of marks of meaning on the infinite canvas. We merely copy and paste third hand concepts which we never test and call ourselves experts on the world and enact policies. Again, the world a concept that may or may not mean anything. Convention determines our understandings. What authentic witness to experience and drifting thoughts under psychic stresses and eases do we bring to bear? Listen to Universals by Earth To Malachi at the link provided. https://earthtomalachi.bandcamp.com/album/universals © Malachi Doyle 2021.

  Where do I come from Lao Tzu? I come from order and chaos clashing I must use words Because my kiss of life Was into the blarney stone & it eclipses what it is eclipsed by Silence   Who broke from the whole A binary source Like a child of 2 parents Love and violence   Darkness begets Light   © Malachi Doyle 2021.      

  What’s a boy to do? (For Lorena Allam)   Lee Scratch Perry’s Afro-Diaspora Plays with genius madness & prophetic gobshite   Calling Out The End Of Days Rockin All The  While   Whilst First Nations Poets-in-being On Country   Still Project & Protect Eternity & Deep listening Against Th’ Incessant assault Of Corporate Greed On top Of & Under Every stone   Whispering We’re Always at the beginning & Here Is where .   So What’s A Boy To Do?   Does One tread lightly?   & Appeal To what’s most holy In Man?   Or sometimes Fire Up Da Bass   & B!tchslap The Bullies Back In their place?   (Btw The last bit’s Not a conclusion)     What’s a boy to do?   It all sounds light As if some kind of joke   That’s English for you ...