have a rest, denis kevans, you've earned it...

Denis Kevans, Australia's Poet Lorikeet, died last week.

Here are three of his poems:

Ah, White Man, have you any sacred sites

Ah, brother, I am searching for the sites sacred to you, Where you walk in silent worship, and you whisper poems, too, Where you tread, like me, in wonder, and your eyes are filled with tears, When you see the tracks you've travelled down your fifty thousand years.

I am searching round Australia, I am searching, night and day, For a site, to you so sacred, that you won't give it away For a bit of coloured paper, say a Church you're knocking down, Or the Rocks, your nation's birhtplace, by the Bridge, in Sydney Town.

Your cathedrals I have entered, I have seen the empty aisles, Where a few knelt down in sorrow, where were all the children's smiles? Big cathedrals, full of beauty, opal glass and gleaming gold, And an old man, in an overcoat, who had crept in from the cold.

Your schools, I drifted through them, heard the sound of swishing canes, Heard the shouts of angry people crushing flowers in our brains, Heard the bark up on the rostrum, where the powers had their say, Wouldn't children's hearts be sacred, though they're made, like mine, of clay?

Where's your wonder? Where's your worship? Where's your sense of holy awe? When I see those little children, torn apart, by fear of war? What is sacred to you, brother, what is sacred to your clan? Are your totems rainbow-feathered? Is there dreaming in you, man?

Sacred … sacred … sacred … gee, you chuck that word about, And when echoes answer sacred … sacred, louder still, you shout, And the echoes come, in patterns, and then, louder, every one, Till they meet, like waves together, and go bang! just like a gun.

Sacred … hesitating … now, a film is reeling through My brain, and through my memory, of our sacred rendez-vous, Of our meeting, of our parting, of my tears, as sweet as ice, Of my numb incomprehension of a shattered paradise.

Sacred, O so sacred, was our sacred rendez-vous, And your ferocious anger, when you found, we weren't like you, But if I should make an act of faith, in a voice, both firm and clear, That there's something sacred to me, you start drowning in your beer.

What is sacred to you, brother, what is sacred to your heart? Is Australia just a quarry, for the bauxite belts to start? Where the forests are forgotten, and the tinkling of the bell Of the bell-bird in the mountains is just something more to sell?

Ah, brother, I am searching for the sites sacred to you, But the rivers, clear as crystal, smell like sewer-fulls of spew, From the pipe and pump polluters, and the nukes that fleck the foam, Would you let a man, with dirty boots, go walking through your home?

Sacred means that, sacred, that's a place where spirits rise, With the rainbow wings of sunset, on the edge of paradise, Sacred, that's my father, that's my daughter, that's my son, Sacred … where the dreaming whispers hope for everyone.

In the silence of the grottoes of Australia's sunny land, Stand together with the Kooris, stand together, hand in hand, Open eyes to endless beauty, and to spirits, far and near, For Australia is my country, hey, it's sacred to me here.

Ah, brother, I am searching for the sites sacred to you, Where you walk, in silent worship, and you whisper poems, too, Where you tread, like me, in wonder, and your eyes are filled with tears, When you see the tracks you've travelled down your fifty thousand years.

The Slouch Of Vietnam

Why should I wear that new slouch hat, the slouch of Vietnam,
Why should I share the napalm-guilt of blundering Uncle Sam,
Why should I hunt down peasant kids, who fight for rights and rice,
Why should I spill this hard-earned blood in a sucker’s sacrifice?

I think of my old Uncles, and their mates, who lie bone-white
On the far-off fields of Flanders, now who promoted that fight?
They’ll teach you that life is precious, then they’ll brush it aside like dust,
But I won’t give my life away ‘cause a brass-hat says I must.

A chilly dusk is falling here, the boxtrees’ shadows stretch,
And through the ring-barked clumps I see the vanished soldiers fetched,
The tall plume on the horseman, the slant brim down below,
As through the mists of memory, the slaughtered slouches go.

There’s young Mick, the cricketer, from frosty Eucumbene,
And “Pally” Tom, the skinner, from the southern Riverine,
And, troop on troop, the squadrons pass, the sun across their cheeks,
Clay-cold, and pale as cellar grass, and not one soldier speaks.

The slouch of brave Gallipoli, that blinded the diggers’ eyes,
The slouch of bloody Passchendaele, where the shell-shock case still cries,
The martyrs hanged in Changi, the heroes killed at Lae,
But the slouch of jungle paddies is a slouch I cannot pay.

Why should I wear that new slouch hat, the slouch of Vietnam,
Why should I share the napalm-guilt of blundering Uncle Sam,
Why should I hunt down peasant kids who fight for rights and rice,
Why should I spill this hard-earned blood in a sucker’s sacrifice?


Concreeto Is Byoo-Tee-Ful!!

Concreeto is byoo-tee-ful !!!!
We need more concreeto in the Blue Mountains,
Because there’s a Big Flood coming,
One in a hundred thousand year flood !
Coming tomorrow morning at 6 minutes past seven,
Noah will be “hanging five” on this flood !

We’ve got to put thirty metres of concreeto on top of the Warra-da-Gamba Dam.,
So bush walkers can walk straight up, and straight down,
Saves time walking around the crooked mountains,
Because concreeto is byoo-tee-ful,
It’s a byo-tee-ful colour grey-ey-ey, nice and smoooothe,

One in a hundred thousand year flood,
One is a very small number, not very attractive,
But 100,000 is fairly attractive, it’s one tenth of a million,
And it’s easy to make a million these days with the—concreeto—
Because concreeto is byoo-tee-ful, it’s a beautiful colour, grey-ey-ey,
Nice and smoo-oothe….cheap to make, dear to sell, I love it---

The Mountains are very crooked, very rough job,
Full of cracks, very rough, rough rocks,
Got to fill it up with the concreeto,
Because concreeto is byoo-tee-ful, it’s a beautiful colour…grey-ey-ey…
Nice and smoo-oo-ooth…fill up all the cracks with the concreeto,

Make a nice big wedding cake from Lapstone to Mount Victoria,
Nice and smooooth,
Got to straighten up all the cliffs, with the concrete-eeto,
So the bush walkers won’t get eye strain
Looking at the crooked cliffs, make them nice and smoo-ooth,
Nice and square, nice and rectangular with the concree-eeto,

Nice straight cliffs and nice square waterfalls,
Because concreeto is byooteeful, it’s a beautiful colour, grey-ey-ey,
Nice and smooooth…..

There’s Warra da Gamba, Vasco da Gamba and Viola Da Gamba,
Now Vasco da Gama he circumcised the world,
In a Spanish Galleon! If he had a concrete ship,
He could conquer the whole world, I came, I saw, I con-creeted !!!
Viola Da Gamba, it’s a concrete violin,
If you don’t like the conductor hit him over the bloody head.

Now we’ve got five rivers in the mountains, the Wollondilly, that’s a silly,
The Kedumba, that’s a dumb name, the Grose, that’s a filthy pooey,
The Cox’s that’s a pornographic, and the Cowdung…
Got to fill em up with the concreeto, make them nice and straight,
Nice and square, nice and smooooth, so the water can run straight
Up and straight down, no more crooked rivers, so the bushwalkers
Can walk straight up and straight down,
Because concreeto is beautiful…it’s a beautiful colour grey-ey-ey…nice and smooooth
Nice and square, nice and straight, with the concree-eeto,
So the bushwalkers can walk straight up and straight down,
Saves time walking round the crooked mountains,
The Wollondilly is Concreeto No 1, The Kedumba Concreeto No 2,
The Grose is Concreeto No 3, The Cox’s is Concreeto No 4,
And the Cowdung is Concreeto No 5, nice and smooth, with the concreeto,
Because concreeto is beautiful…it’s a beautiful colour, grey-ey-ey, nice and smooooth,

Some people come to the mountains for the O-ZONE
I come for the RE-ZONE..
Some people like the multiplication and division,
I like the multiplication and SUB-DIVISION…
With the concreeto, because concreeto is byooteeful,
It’s a byooteeful colour, grey-ey-ey, nice and smooooth,

These bushwalkers say the bush is a “Cathedral Without Walls”,
How stupeedo! You’ve got no walls, we’ve got the con-creeto !
Because concreeto is byoo-tee-ful, it’s a byoo-tee-ful colour, grey-ey-ey,
Nice and smoooothhh…

* * * * * * *

Rest in peace, Denis...
..