This my own remix of  Breathe The Sun, by Susan (SackJo) and Sturzstrom. I’m not generally known for my hip-hop skills – but I’ll try anything once & I’m pleased with the result  – especially my Jack Thompson impersonation!  The whole lyric is based around Susan’s original words & Sturzstrom’s infectious pulse and rhythm and that dopplering bike.

Thanks Sturzstrom for the amazing production (love the sub-bass) and Susan for your cool words and sexy voice.

• Info

The Universe listens by robwalkerpoet

(click the title above to hear it. Use good headphones!)

The Universe listens

bright morning   everything new
day’s unfolding just for you

Breathe the sun weather fine
on your bike elastic time

rhythm is life soundtrack’s groovy
everyone extras in your private movie

traffic flows   manmade river
Wind on my scalp shaved my hair
Where am I going? anywhere…

Gotta keep moving, feel the pulse
This is real, nothing false
Part of everything. The All is Me.
Pushing forward. Feeling free.

Breathe the sun.
Breathe the sun.

Heartbeat throb.
Life is rhythm.
Ears wide open.
The universe listens.
The Universe listens

bright morning everything new
day’s unfolding just for you

Breathe the sun weather fine
on your bike elastic time

rhythm is life soundtrack’s groovy
everyone extras in your private movie

traffic flows manmade river
Wind on my scalp shaved my hair
Where am I going? anywhere…

Gotta keep moving, feel the pulse
This is real, nothing false
Part of everything. The All is Me.
Pushing forward. Feeling free.

Breathe the sun.
Breathe the sun.

Heartbeat throb.
Life is rhythm.
Ears wide open.
The universe listens.

I’ve just won the 3^rd Annual RiAus Sci-ku competition. (“Inspired by the Japanese haiku, sci-ku is a 3 line poem which gives us a flash of insight like the scientific “Eureka!” moment.)

2012 is the Year of the Farmer. My theme was the symbiosis of nature and agriculture as exemplified in the amazing way that the humble clover takes an inert gas from the atmosphere and uses it to improve our soils and food:

This was a concentrated haiku version of a poem (Balansa Clover) published on the Stylus Poetry Journal ’way back in 2005:

Balansa clover

i sowed              this balansa clover

in one furrow at the top of the hill

knowing it was hardcoated

to survive the gut of sheep

to be broadcast in its own organic

fertilizer pellet   its           descendants spread through

an acre paddock.

i pull    at a clump teasing fibrous roots

from moist soil and marvel at white

nodules             microfactories of sym

biotic bacteria mining

nitrogen from the air

fertilizer for the                neighbours in this

community of plants.

Thanks to RiAus for supporting both connections between science and poetry and its generosity – my 3 line poem won me a Kindle Touch e-reader!

Len Mosley composed and performed all the music which inspired the words. Len’s kind-of-jazzy track has a great pop-with-swing feel that reminded me of Dire Straits. The swing vibe and his request to ‘write something nostalgic’ led to a train of thought about a childhood memory I’d started to write about a while back. I’d been stuck because it was too literal (it’s all true) to be a poem and not long enough to be a short story.

After I’ve listened to it a few times it seems the music and the lyric are made for each other. The guitar break in the middle section has a pretty, innocent sound which suggested simple pleasures to me and Len’s keyboard work even reminds me a bit of fairground music.

Thanks Len for another great collaboration from 7700 km away!

The Finger.

Originally written as why I didn’t go to mike ladd’s 50^th birthday party, a kind of ‘the dog ate my homework’ letter of apology to my Max-Mo mate, poet Mike Ladd. The story’s 100% true. I still lack feeling (and always will) in the finger tip, making certain guitar chords and shakuhachi notes difficult. My carelessness also resulted in missing a really good party by all accounts. But quite a decent poem came out of it… Thanks to Anandamine for the cool music & production.

Why I missed Mike Ladd’s 50^th Birthday Party.

The tractor-mower hits a stump on the slope and

flips in a second. Thrown off, earphones ripped from

the iPod when Sergio is between mas que na and da.

Then an adrenalin-fuelled leap to avoid

being crushed between tractor and post

and trailing fingers go thump in the blades.

When the eyes see the end of the finger hanging,

a flap of mincemeat, a second thump of the heart –

orchestral stab in a horror movie soundtrack.

The other hand squeezes

mashed flesh to stem the flow.

The drive to Flinders Medical Centre, cold sweat

dripping into eyes, blood dripping on gumboots,

willing myself to breathe slowly. Pain like hot needles.

Triage, grass-clippings on the ER floor

Calming pulse, x-rays. The matter-of-fact

Egyptian surgeon with French accent.

At first my eyes clamp shut but

he works for almost an hour reconnecting

nerves, tissues and finally skin.

I watch him fascinated as he reconstructs

the end of my ring finger,

a busted raw sausage held together

with fine blue thread.

© rob walker, 2011.

Originally published as why I missed Mike Ladd’s 50^th birthday party

in Metabolism: Australian Poetry Members Anthology, an e-journal released in early 2012

ISBN: 978-0-9871-7650-9 Dewey Number: A821.3