Unmanned | Page 6

he came out of the Holy Land.
Domestic Pack Shots
1. The Gays Next Door
shrieking like hyenas in?their sexual mirth to the disco?bang of Madonna making her?mint in the sacrilegious from the?sacred. For some, perhaps, a?continuous custom to hang together?whatever sense of family may?be had once the wild oats?have passed into the photograph album:?circa: June, in some tumbled month,?the garden hose spurting champagne?and the neighbour, suspect as?an affair, out of shot.
2. Working Hot
Joe Hammer makes his move on?screen and the girl cries out for Mamma.?A family of sperm packs up and moves?house. The removal of limbs.?The images dim to an impotent mauve?and the stage act begins. Shes?only working warm, consistent as a?vibrator. She hopes one day?to make big bucks; the conference?room, that is, before she hits twenty.?The one spotlight fixes on?the portico between her thighs.?The audience soughs in the dark. Strippers?dont have no union, strippers dont.?O Karen, your smile, cool as a cucumber.
3. Hooking For Jesus
Let us sing the rosellas who?buckle under branches for the paper-bark?blossom, and the far distant shadows?on slate-roofs. Let us herald the?Children of God, the Family of Love,?progeny of the Jesus Freaks founded in?Oakland, California back in the 70s.?And this child, who believes?Bethlehem resides in her fourteen year?old womb. Hers is the pioneering?spirit caught in a spectral watercolour.?There she leans, under the guiding?star of a single streetlight, while?bluestone clouds move away over?St Kilda into yellow, polite paddocks.
4. The Priest Across The Lane
in the presbytery is maxed out?from the exo-bike, beads of sweat drip?off his fingertips. He is purged?of the last house-boy from the?jungle parish in Papua New Guinea, ten?years previous. He pounds at the?peck-deck in his lounge room?wishing the garden hand were an opera?singer. Several repeats of the?pole-twists and his bowels grunt like a?sermon. A final glass of claret drops?him to his knees ashen faced. His?big bath steams plump now, full?as the Jordan river. The one bedroom?light burns on the lemon bush?which holds its globes of fruit like?a juggler stopped mid-trick.
Chelmsford Street, Newtown, Sydney
5. Corruption Is Glorified Mateship
Its Bastille Day in Sydney.?The weird man in the moon falls to the?night basket. Stars roll out?another lottery and unemployment raises?dust over the land. Tout est perdu?fors lhonneur. Among thieves.?Running with images I whirl out the?rainbow. Spring flutters as the National?flag to salute the pilot whales?herding one more disastrous landing.?Waves roll head-to-head round?the plate of The Great South Land.?Which way to Wynyard, calls?the currawong. Helicopters line up like?magi over Bankstown. When you?look up, that old full moon makes you?feel like a cowpoke, dont it?
6. Inner City Camping Blues
under a dusty-hulled moon out?of an empty Hollywood lot placed there?in the out-take of twilight. The?bus families have arrived in convoy.?Stolidly parked nearby in protest?at two suburban parks up for auction in?a depressed market. A couple of?pitched tents and an Information Stand?of press clippings. Kids play in a?refuse pit between tossed aside railway?sleepers. Slung about the Council?Chambers fairy lights all a twinkle since?the last bi-election a year back;?not much in this, not even a picnic.
Tarts & Takeaways
is what hes into, he said &?thats fine by me (William street in?winter and pissing down is the pits)?standing around in doorways waiting?for some totally wasted guy excuse me!?its a trick is what it is to?slap his dumb meat between my thighs.?Hey, Im Jasmine though I dont?feel like one. Mostly bored.?On each hip Ive got this tattoo, says?Allan kind of smudgy & out of focus?because its real old. The main?man. A jerk off really in someone?elses life. A lifer. Summers?shit, more noise and especially groups.?For hours or however long it takes?& I do Spanish & French, but Im?better at French. Sometimes not much?happens. Idle as a lizard pointing?brickwork on hot buildings, someone said.?I read in this magazine once,?(I meet all sorts) and this guy?says, nor can I say I love you?but a gentle calligraphy informs your?brow. What a whacker! I know shit?from clay, he just reckoned he could get?away with saying nothing. Dickhead!?Guys are like that with money?like its some fucking secret.
Who Killed Brett Whiteley
Actually, it was Lloyd Rees?killed off Brett Whiteley who couldnt?live the promise of old age,?the calm terror of it. Thats what?Rees meant in his letter to Brett:
carry the torch forward?and something about being a warrior?for Art. Brett, in fact, was?skittled by a high powered mix of?narcissism & clown. Forget what?he had to, or couldnt leave behind &?anything to do with High Seriousness.?He got caught up in latitudes?of sex where the Olgas loomed round as?buttocks. Brett became his own?myth when he died, and effectively?slammed the door on the 60s.?Maybe some other seascape, like Thera,?suggestive of broken altars;?looking down into the cratered harbour?he might have seen beneath the?lapis lazuli waters, an ivory?scimitar held in the gaze of Portunus,?perfectly preserved, snapped in two.
Sugarbag Carpenter
Them days all you?needed was a blunt saw &?an axe thrown in a
sack. If you could?drive a 3" nail through a?pound of butter
you got the