I KNOW it’s been a long time between posts. I’ll get better but look, June has been insane. As you’ve known though I’ve had Pride Events all month. I got to showcase the amazing work of Story Stones, Penrith’s Inclusive Writing Group and then later, interview Benjamin Law is one of the most amazing hours. Seriously, the conversation was amazing. I’ll give you a play by play later, I promise.

Another event is happen, though, I want to briefly talk about that wasn’t on my list of events.

Tonight (21st of June) I’ll be presenting one of my poems in a future anthology I’ll be releasing some time in the future. I feel this one is meant to be performed on a stage, so I look forward to testing out the poem for the first time. So when Westwords LGBTQIA+ Writers’ Group agreed to do a pride event this June I immediately knew what I was going to read. The Open Mic night is open to anyone–with Westwords doors opening at 6pm for a 6:30pm start and finished at 8pm. I’d supply you a link to their website discussing it but you can head over to Westwords Instagram account for last minute details. (After all, I am posting about it on the day of the event.)

Here’s the piece I’ll be presenting, but trust me, it’s better in person:

Of Pillows, Coffee, Birds, And Skies

Lightly the rain falls from the heavens,
drops of autumn and winter,
constant current from the clouds,
hitting loudly, a siege against my senses against the gutters of my nightmare, forcing my eyelids open with a crowbar and thrusting my large peaceful slumber into a small drainage pipe and sending it off to the unknown where my ability to fall back to sleep is gone and nothing my desires can do to mentally tear away the gutters or at least coat it with silence can ever bring back what I have lost!
Oh, how I miss you, the peaceful promise of the blue skies.

Pitter patter my coffee maker calls,
liquid gold, warm and desiring,
a new soul injected into my depths,
slurping immensely, a siege against my senses against the bowl of morning substance, forcing my ears to ring with the clink of the spoon as it dives into the depths of wheat and honey and each time you thrust the cereal down to soak it into the very milk we have run out of, a desire of pouring my milk-less coffee over you feeds the impatience of our never-ending coupling full of snores and complaining!
Oh, how I miss you, my milk-less coffee.

An open window and the song of birds,
neighbour’s laughing contagiously behind the fence,
the warm sounds of the world on cold ears,
voices emanating, a faceless father beyond the fence that scolds a child, a repetitive song, decapitating the nature’s lullaby, between the two of you, and it leaves me to wonder how many damn times one must say no before the child will listen or one gets off their fat ass and removes the child from the situation in which you say no to,  no no no no no no no, oh that many times, more times than the songbird repeats its song!
Oh, how I miss you, serenity of the songbirds.

And finally, the serenity of pillows,
soft and alluring seductions of slumber,
reminder of lullabies and days over,
feathers wanting, with my head nuzzled into your depths of solitude slowly sliding my eyelids to the edge of dreams until the hidden shadows of gray clouds bring forth another round of rain where they strike the gutters like an orchestra of nail guns and the bed jolts as my coupling joins me with complaining followed by the roar of snores that outshine even the songbird and an incessant father, my ears pleading for me to seal them all shut!
Oh, how I miss you, depths of solitude.