Pam Brown
4 lines a day, today
english to english
four lines a day
a quaint forest
a crossword clue
*
gonna keep on travelling
till I find m’self
some place to go
partial journey, frequent flyer
*
what makes you male
what makes you female
genes and hormones (why ask me)
external internal genitalia
*
mobile phone fumbling
a call from the airport
stoned and anxious
premonition of a plane crash
*
I recommend glucose
and that magazine
Marge Simpson reads -
‘Better Homes than Yours’
*
leave the middle land
to get an education
churning out another
FINE YOUNG ADULT
*
just want to be
just want a jet ski
lock the taskbar
rock the casbah
*
fall asleep
mid-afternoon
lulling thock-thock
a Kreepy Krawly
*
a pitchfork tine
pierces a toe
inaugural parade
in a wheelchair
Adjustments
‘there is no time’
LOU REED, New York
first adjustment
live in a house
hairline stress
cold repairs
second adjustment
can’t keep up
should be
lying down
reading books
relaxed
planting plants
should be
wealthy
could be
working
on a poem
or a hot pot
can’t be
fucked
someone
builds a cupboard
the radio
talks
in three rooms
watch
the system updates
blue bar shiver
on liquid crystal
costs a lot
nothing happens
lonely problems
buy some wood
shout out
in the night
storm out
in driving rain
storm back in
next adjustment
race around
block up
the gaps
replace
the clock battery
sulk in the office
stare at the carpet
count the hours
Pam Brown has published many books including Text thing (Little Esther Books, 2002) and Dear Deliria (Salt Publishing, 2003) which was awarded the NSW Premier’s Prize for Poetry in 2004. In September 2007, Tinfish Press published farout-library-software, a collection of collaborative poems written with the Seattle-based Egyptian poet Maged Zaher. Pam Brown is the associate editor of Jacket magazine and a contributing editor for Fulcrum and How2. She keeps a blog (thedeletions.blogspot.com).