Poems for Money, and No Kicks for Free


Verse 1
The air smells of printer’s ink and cold coffee,
and the page stares back like a shopfront window
where the mannequins wear my metaphors,
price tags swinging from their wrists.

I used to think the words were a kind of weather —
blowing in from nowhere,
soaking me through for the sheer joy of it.
Now they arrive in invoices,
in neat...

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They name me Cleaver, though I am no hand,
but the patient edge of centuries,
a blade honed by the Southern swell,
by wind that tastes of iron and kelp.

I split the dolerite as kin are split —
not in malice, but in the slow necessity
of tide and time,
each fracture a journal of what was kept,
and what was carried away.

Below, the broth seethes —
foam thick as ghost‑milk,
stea...

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parched wind, salt‑tongued

from the far edge of the bay,

licks the last drift of

mauve jacarandas.

in the tin‑roof blush,

I hear the slow heartbeat

of soil— patient, cracked,

still keeping the memory of rain.

I walk the market’s narrow spine,

hands grazing mango skins,

the laughter of vendors lifting

like myna birds into a sky

just beginning to remembe...

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gate mist

in the hour

before names

footstep /

echo /

gone

puddle edge

holds the sky

too still

.

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Once I was starling voice at dawn, 
A flock of chimed echoes on my tongue,
Wheezing whistles on choralled lawn,
Each verse a mimic so sweetly sung.

Now I’m a lyrebird lost in the brush,
Framing my solos in shadowed boughs,
With heart unfolding in trembling rush,
A lonesome lilting with hidden vows.

With cheeslets and flummox in my beak,
I sift the flock’s bright feathers from my cor...

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It was nearly midnight

when he slipped out of bed,

careful not to wake her.

The house exhaled its silence—

walls warm with sleep,

timber creaking

from the day’s last heat.

He padded to the kitchen

in bare feet, opened the cupboard

where li’l miss had hidden

a note for him the day before:

“I love you even when you forget milk.”

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i lean into the salt wind,

fingers tracing faint ridges

in damp sand.

“Where is my oyster?” i ask the horizon,

its answer swallowed by surf.

Kester Reed waits behind a driftwood break,

taps the shell-shards underfoot,

listens for that hollow note

that might be its name.

“What would it be, even?” he murmurs,

searching for shape in shadows.

O...

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"streambound" 

In the stream before thought, 

a silver thread spills from a cloud’s open palm. 

It beads the air with patient syllables, 

falling into the current where our minds already drift.

We wade in — ankles claimed by the cold, 

our boots drinking more than we do. 

Above, heaven’s ladle tips again, 

its rain stitching ripples into the moving mirror.

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"flight mode"

The higher they climbed, the quicker they blurred,  

Wrapped in code and status conferred.  

Juno sat still, mapped the ache,  

Her descent revealed what ascent forsake.  

A world within—a pulse, a thread—  

Flight not above, but through instead.

.

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"The Impossible Turn"

To hold what harms, to face without flinching, to shape warmth from wire.

To drop the name, to meet the eyes, to let edges soften.

To burn the mold, to kneel in ash, to rise listening.

Not conquest. Not perfection. Only forward motion.

.

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"Clockwork Reverie"

Tick tock — the echo mocks,

Time slips through paradox,

A ghost in velvet gloves, unseen,

Dancing deep where thoughts convene.

Murky depths and rhyming schemes,

Fractured poets chase their dreams,

Feathers inked with crimson lore,

Minutes bleeding evermore.

The spool unwinds, the tongue forgets,

What once was sung now drips regr...

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“untethered”

shelves of faces wheel past our names

we dissolve on blinking glass—

silent exits logged but never traced

by the circuits that once claimed us

our missteps vanish in tangled code,

no pardon queued;

the platform shrugs in empty bits,

leaving apologies half-typed and gone

perhaps erasure spills relief:

we unhook from worn-out errors,

...

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late winter's bright skies 

buds and sprouts begin to form

New Year's vibrant song.

in the gentle breeze,  

mem'ries sprout with new life,  

herald new year's joy.

New Year’s breath tendrils

it must now be that season

melting snow and all

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Through the moor she whistles,

her presence a crystal shard,

slicing through the night air

scented with damp earth and pine.

Windows tremble, trees yield,

cries ripple across the barren plains.

Her voice, an echo of distant storms,

resonates from the ocean's depths,

a spectral cry that chills the bones.

She strides under the moon’s watchful eye,

her shadow...

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cleverly shunned
this clever lad
who once was
quite celebrated
applauded, even; 
that once and
clever tyke —

little did he know
one forward day
when he'd've all
up and grown
dependable lads 
are what's wanted

clever 'uns were

interesting enough
for a bit of a larf but
just a tad annoying;
when things gotta
be done — go figure
dependability and

cleve...

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