i'm tired/ but what's a little darkness around the
eyes/ it doesn't mean that i'm not strong/ not healthy/
& i'm not a chick for vulgarity/ or your hey baby baby/
car howling horn honking/ give us a blowjob/ slut
moll rag stupidity/ you do not know how this quietly
affects me/
if you had the guts to get out & approach
me directly/ i would gouge out your eyes/ like the
red-eyed cocky/ old bedraggled white feathers/ with
even older tricks/ do not touch cocky/ cocky bites/
& blood on the dry old beak/ & a sad grey chain
eating grey feet/ the hard old clown of the petshop/
so i'm telling you/ observers of womanly anger/ of
insecurity/ i respect you in your place/ in your
space not mine/ but come within arm's length of me/
& i'll make sure we're on a train platform/ so i can
shove you onto the tracks/ in time for the quarter
past nine/ all stations to town hall via regents
park/
but i hear you protesting/ you can't go around
pushing people off/ or the police will pick you up/
but i was only defending my intimate self/ but you'll
be defending yourself in court/ well it's all self
defence in the end/ the jury/ the judge/ the
prosecutor/ mostly men/ how many have raped?/
in the end my father said/ he wouldn't get me a gun/
'cause i'd shoot my boyfriend if he burnt the toast/ he
was probably right/ i probably would/ & then he told
all his drinking mates/ that my ex-lover served the
coffee cold/ so she dropped 'im orf in the middle
of the nullarbor/
actually it was port augusta bus
terminal/ 'cause he stopped taking his medication/
& bashed me up/ he said i was lucky to have him/
(guess i ran outa luck)/ & i'm still walking these
childhood streets/ with silly dreams about safeness/
security/ a mate for life/ which have become in their
maturity/ a little more dangerous for me/ i who once
lived fearlessly/
i look past the revved-up cars into
a hidden backyard aviary/ & i see a turquoise parrot/
its tired head distressed/ broken down/ resting on
a section of branch/ i cannot see its face/ this
parrot/ which must live its pathetic life amid such
ugliness/ i bite my lip/ the sky is overcast/ i pray
to no religion: give me an ending/ or a beginning to
this/
i am guarding my precious self/ against the
violent western suburbs of today/ & in my own angry
way/ i have joined forces with its decaying morality/
in a last ditch effort to protect my body & preserve
my sanity/ i know i have a right to walk the streets
before the 1970s/ the right to release the birds/
the freeing of wings like thundering footsteps/ or
the flying of bullets/ into this suburban abyss
