The Tide of Life

The life of man can be explained, it seems

as being similar to a tide and the sea.

A parallel can be drawn, this means,

between the oceans of the world, and me.

Life starts out with the infant's first breath

As the new tide starts with water's turn

Building life slowly so far from death

Experience and knowledge, so much to learn

With boundless enthusiasm of the child,

Tide rushes into each entrance and shore.

Investigating and analysing each feature un-filed.

Swirling and twirling, searching for more.

Turbulence and trauma of the growing inrush,

Restless adolescence changing the score.

Rationality and reason abandoned, faces aflush.

Waves, bursting and breaking over rocky shores.

Quietly flowing into spaces, seeking involvement.

Adulthood arrives providing welcome relief.

Nature and relationships and total commitment

Expanses and environs filling, contacts less brief.

Romance and marriage top the agenda

Hugging the earth with love's sweet embrace

Clinging to each shoreline, feature of splendour

Wherever the seawaters swirl, rip and race

With maturity comes Man's ultimate perfection

The tide is now high and peaks at its crest

Traffic is busy, ships and boats coming and going

Swimmers and surfers there's no time to rest.

Life seems so busy with tide at high levels

Endless responsibilities pulling all ways.

Constant demand and pressure dishevels

No sign of relief at this time of day.

With the tide turning to the outward repletion,

Time to reflect on achievements now past.

Retracting waters revealing jobs completion.

Exposing the tide's efforts, time racing so fast.

The end is in view, tide ready to change

Time to review the efforts now done

A measure of tide's success to arrange

How does it justify the race it has run?

Life cycle is completed and now looking back

All that is left of our tides mighty furore

Is a single line printed in a used Almanac

And smooth damp sand on a forgotten shore.

So think about your one and only life tide

And how you will live it on god's sweet earth

Don't waste a minute of the gift of the ride

And think on how you will judge life's worth.

By Peter Hurst

A Dog's Life

Pavlov, can you do something about your mongrel.

Look at the mess!

Slobber everywhere

and the bells,

tinkle tinkle,

tinkle tinkle.

day and night.

What is it with you?

Nothing better to do?

Pavlov,

get a life,

and Pavlov, can you please do something about your mongrel.

By Phil Heang

Shallow

You skim across the surface
Your words flitting like pebbles
Flat blunt stones
Cast forward

Such meaningless statements
You pelt dull descriptions
Obvious prescriptions
Stating the obvious
You say everything
Regurgitate
Recapitulate
... everything

Yes even the dynamic
... the complex ... the magical
Reduced

Sketching human patterns with the blandest brush
A jaded palate
The broadest strokes
Skimming over details
Like flippant pebbles
Minus the ripples
For your words leave no mark

Left to your simplicity
Your rights and wrongs, light and dark
Them and us, me and you
I envy your peace of mind
Your lack of fitful dreams
Yet you leave a bitter taste,
Your ignorant bliss obscene

I walk away, descend within
Leave you skipping pebbles
Shallow presence by a stream

By Imbi Johnston

Twixt and between

In sharp shine of sunlight on leaf
and in deep dark pooling of shadow
somewhere twixt and between
there is movement
there is dance

in silver-winged flash of red damsel fly
and twirl and slash of flick-tailed fish
somewhere twixt and between
god hovers at vision’s edge

somewhere twixt and between
god waits

by Lynn Scott-Cumming 2009

Embers

From the Smallest Embers Rise the Beasts of Fire Like the Phoenix
And the hot ashes from their flapping wings fall on snow-white clouds and plunge the earth into darkness.

From the smallest embers I drew fire to trace your form on the forest floor
And now walls of flame race through the landscape of twigs and thorns

In the roar of this great fire, I hear the laughter of that single ember.

By Nikesh Murali

A Lazy Summers Morn

I lie on a blanket in a grassy field

Surrounded by a stand of magnificent trees;

Closing my eyes to the sights now revealed

Feeling the kiss of the early morning breeze

My naked body absorbs the warmth

Radiating from the sun that's rising at last

Filling my being with life giving force

Drained by physical labours now past.

I hear water flowing in a nearby brook

Bouncing and bubbling over leaves in decay

Caressing each pebble as it passes each nook

Tumbling and falling over rocks in its way.

Bellbird's melodies tinkle down from the trees

Playing their part in nature's sweet song;

A medley of notes, trying always to please

A continuum of sound echoing all day long.

The camp fire still burns, its place in the shade

Exuding fragrant aromas from cooking and smoke

That Eucalyptus leaves and pine cones have made,

Warming a billy of water to wash and to soak.

My opening eyes play on horizons afar

Such expansive boundaries for man to cross,

Shimmering haze at distance with eyes just ajar

Images and objects distorted, fine details are lost.

May this peace and tranquillity continue forever,

This beautiful country pleases and eases the fervour.

It permeates and overpowers me in this glorious weather

For paradise on earth I need travel no further.

This has to be life at its glorious best

Worries and cares forever gone

Where naught needed but relaxation and rest

While I'm here in heaven on this glorious morn.

Poem by Peter Hurst, Drawing by Rae Enever

T'Ville Anthology

Great news! The T'ville anthology is now available for download. Go to the Chronicles of T'ville blog for more information or to download your copy.

Congratulations to WITS members Kerry Ashwin, Lori Hurst, Peter Hurst, Nikesh Murali, Stephen Ryan and Casey Salt! All your hard work has finally paid off!

Path

Always the path twists and turns.

Never a straight road so

you can look back and say,

'I've been from there to here.'

You look back and see a bend.

You try and imagine,

'Where was I at the start of the day?'

All this weaving and winding,

conspiring to confound your sense of direction.

Who planned this path?

What convoluted,

tortured mind gave us this?

Why can't the way be straight?

Why, why?

Y is a crooked letter,

Z no better.

By Phil Heang

Extract - Seagulls visiting the picnic of life

Riding abiding by your thoughts
your actions, your progress
through every breath.

Walking, stalking your doubts
your fears, your anxieties
through every death.

Standing demanding your joys,
your smiles, your victories
through every win.

Lying, reclining your loves
your passion, your loving
through every grin.

Travelling tropical philosophical writings of Andy King.

The Next Big Writer

I recently joined TheNextBigWriter.com and entered the Times are Tough Drabble/Droubble writing competition. The challenge was to look at this photo and write an extremely short work of fiction as either a Drabble (exactly 100 words) or a Droubble (exactly 200 words). This is my Drabble entry:

Her shadow brushed his boots as she walked closer, but he didn't look up. He didn't want pity from this woman with her high heels and fancy clothes.

He hunched his shoulders and pushed his cold hands deeper into his pockets. He wished she'd go away. Soon enough she did; heels clicking as she crossed the street.

Startled at the sound of a gunshot so close, she turned back. Her brows rose in surprise as she watched an old man slump slowly to the ground, a revolver falling to the pavement beside him.

She hadn't even known he was there.

Why not have a go yourself and let us know what you came up with?

By A'Mhara Russell

To speak of...

Let me unveil the source of my presupposition
Here, devour this... a side dish
Garnished with stale contrition

Watch me as I disarm myself
Presented, plattered up for you
You’re welcomed to feast upon my rendition
Recurring choice of self indulgent volition
Regurgitated, time and again
Insurgent epiphany, I feel it wax and wane...

You see... regrettably, I see through your suppositions,
Your visions, your subsequent propositions
Your assumptions, and your deductions
Implicitly, your statements
Betray something in of themselves
Exposing unacknowledged truths from subconscious realms
They reveal something about you which your admissions belie
I will not deny
I cannot know for sure
What it is that they imply
But I know that they allude to dreams,
Those which are not your own
I have no faith in your authenticity
But I’ve met you before, so it must be me
A different face, the same case
This, the source, to which I alluded in first verse
The illusions I set out initially to disperse.

Convoluted poetic discourse
A cowardly choice, an indirect recourse
Honestly I set out with a purpose - to elucidate.
Make clear what I think of you and your opinions of my opinions of myself.

I offered fuel for the fire
Planned to tie myself to the pyre
Predictable of me and my proclivity to self depreciate
The reasoning? I’ve long since ceased to ruminate.
Still, as I said, I set out with hopes to emancipate
Simplify things through full disclosure

This circumlocution, my only solution
A path of avoidance, a crafted volution
But can you see these words, see how they smother
Attempts to confront turn to dashes for cover.

A vocabulary - ambiguous in its goals
I allow precious words, conflicting roles
A rhyming word can justify the expression of the absurd
Backtrack and question, what it is that you’ve heard
Marvel at how uncomplicated statements can diffuse and diverge
Indulge in the dictionary, splash out, splurge.

But oh, these words
These liberating submissions
Voice to the thoughts, words to the visions
They render my crackling sentiments inert
Yet I find no direct way to speak of the hurt.

By Imbi Johnston

Ode to WITS

With fortitude, tenacity, vigor and vim,
We writers of Townsville are more than a whim.
We write with style.
We write with grace.
We write with adverbs, commas and ...pace.

No grammar eludes us,
No syntax confounds.
We have the knowledge.
Our structure is sound.

But as we write
At our desk and chair,
Oh where to place it,
Oh where, oh where?

We yearn for favour
And small recognition.
So we scribble away
From dreams to fruition.

And in the process
We meet new scribes,
And Wednesday nights
Abound with vibes.

But don't lose heart,
Attend every week,
So with diligence and practice
You'll attain your peak.

A ballad, a poem, a rhyme, a story.
One of these will bring you glory
But if you aspire to a higher plain,
Then cerebral wisdom will be your gain.

They say advice
Is like giving a bald man a comb
But my advice to writers
I have known....

Is never give up
For surely one day
You'll write that best seller.
That one that will pay!




By K.J. Ashwin ( ditties on Demand)