Dead thoughts of corpses - Poem by Ivan Donn Carswell

The symbols that we use are T shirts of the dead
thoughts of corpses without heads, a rictus
without sound – open-mouthed, empty, unbound.
And if you ever write those clichés which incite
my approbation, fuck you, I am not amused.
And if I ever do, then fuck me too.

I battle with the icons of our time, not so much the images as
those inclined to overuse the gushing phrases, rabid writers
praising vapid lies, journalistic worms still at the maggot stage
of feeding on the headless corpses, reading symbols from their
graphic shirts, descending into dismal depths of gutter
meaninglessness and desperate doggerel.

The nearest I have heard a ‘personality’ decline
hysterical inanity was when he said,
“that’s real life, it doesn’t always have
a happy ending…” he had described his own demise,
he fell from grace, he was displaced by higher ratings
inspired through insipid boardroom compromise.

My sympathy was strained within a breath of balanced reason,
drained of all compassion and decision by the consequences
rising from Steve Irwin’s death. When networks went beyond the pale
of deference and showed the clichéd scenes of Steve and baby Bob
and croc repeatedly as counterpoint I was incensed. He’d died that afternoon.
And there they were, already feeding on a feast of vile controversy.

But further yet, the eunuch bitch with no veneer, of course
I mean her holiness Ms Germaine Greer, thundered into print
to plant her boot as firmly as she could into a legend she
maintains is self-delusion. Not unusual for Germaine.
The Doctor has delusions too, she believes with vagrant honesty
that she eclipses Steve in every form of tragi-comedy.

Forgive Germaine diffusing post-menopausal class delusion,
back in her menses and her prime she was a tart of class.
But if I died would it ignite the journalistic anchovies?
I called them nasty names and damned their plight, I hope
I earn precocious right to cause a feeding frenzy by them,
and pray that irukandji bite them on the disrespectful arse…
© I.D. Carswell