posted on June 22, 2011 at 3:34 pm

the bondi strindbergs

i am the chill severe papa down here in these colonies

our lives paradoxically skandanavian in its existential struggle

a harsh conceited man who has made and lost fortunes

father to an unlikely number of daughters each impossibly lovely

my coach has broken down in an enchanted forest

i am old but still vaguely handsome as i wander in the snow

years of city living have left me unprepared for the wilderness

i am a merchant and my ship of dreams has run aground

my horse disappeared into the darkness

my fortune was only in words and words became cheap

and i said something once and no one remembered

and i said something once and no one forgot

the trees are old and scarred they seem to sneer

the moon over head is neither here nor there

its place in the story unclear

the night is antiseptic and frozen

the sparkling stars are captured as if on velvet membrane black

a loud voice in my head shouts defiantly at the night

the other voices are quiet and waiting to see

and the forest squeezes itself in roots and in fronds

its thought given form in spirit which animates matter

an unknown past

a distant future

oh now for the warm bath the opium pipe the touch of woman

oh for the crisp sheets oh for the toast and jam and mulled wine

the night full of its beasts unseen but moving in undergrowth

the night full of traps and pits and rusty old hooks

the night full of whispers from the grave

the night full of its mists smelling faintly of some far-off laboratory

the night of thorn the night of claw

the night of snout the night of bone

expelled from time during some dismal spell

and now you merchant have wandered into the domain of Lunacy

who am the master of these lands and some great feline terror

and he will play with you in his long lit halls

and things will move of their own accord

a very bad dream

a long moment between lives

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