Fast Talker

David Eggleton

• Publisher: Auckland University Press
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781869403607
• eBook ISBN: 9781775580652
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism in Poetry
• Index: Literature

This dynamic poetry collection combines punchy political and social awareness with tender observations of everyday life. Embracing a wide variety of subjects, these poems constantly shift in tone and rhythm, ranging from hard-hitting "rants" on the South Pacific, the media, big business, war, and capitalism to gentle lyricisms on love, travel, and the landscapes that the author calls home. Part showman patter, part incantation, part prophetic diatribe, these writings display an energetic and witty style that masterfully merges forceful images with inventive language.

THREE MESSAGE STICKS

VANISHING MAP

Under zero-sum games of festering sun

and daredevil shapes of sub-machine guns,

the shrouded spinning bride is wooed

by swivel-eyed slaphead and gang of goons.

Shoeless fighters slope like panthers after

King George rubbed smooth as a wine waiter,

smooth as mahogany. His plantation dog

stalks curfewed towns, a medallioned god.

In drummed time to coconuts chopped apart,

new market-masters upset old pineapple carts.

They ukelele like ghosts round sly-grog bowls,

urging all peoples to make ready their souls.

Resort dancers tralala in leis of frangipani,

firewalkers of Diwali sway in Hindustani.

Bush orchids send gardens drunk with scent,

but coup-money sweat stains khaki government.

A weedeater’s busy engine gabbles its pidgin,

wringing out discourses on freedom’s meaning.

Villages let small tongues of flame feed at night,

red hibiscus bleeding into dawn’s grey light.

Hot days crawl past, so brooding and sluggish,

termites riddling the islands’ map to lattice.

Rusty jaws crush dark rivers of molasses

towards sea whose surf blooms white as narcissus.

NAME OF THE HURRICANE

Waves hit the breakwater,

break like laughter,

lantern glass gets crazed

by cat-o’-nine-tails,

planks are yanked wise

from household nails,

to capsize caves of jails,

in the twang of wire rails,

the rustle of tree flails,

the whine of wind’s veils,

as tossed grit of ashpits,

bits of tobacco butts,

whirl above galvanised

iron prised,

and free tarpaulins torn,

where branches borne

fight weightlessness,

the way a crab grabs mud,

squelched on and dug

deep in that moment

when the ear hears

mouthed faithlessness,

and the eye notes the bay,

eerily calm of foment,

until again the rain,

and bamboo cane brakes

thrashed to stashed mulch,

as any croaks of regret

are stripped to mutter

with husks down gutters

of electrical fret,

and in fronds unwoven

that shrivel cloven,

stung by the sea

hung in the sky —

those swaying beads

flung horizontally,

to fray under

cloud mattresses

of clapped-out thunder,

where tide’s rocks bare

sharp teeth to air,

and sea spray scribbles

wilder shore’s cover,

spelling the name

of the hurricane over.

A PACIFIC ISLANDER REFLECTS IN CUBA STREET

The face of Che Guevara lives on the torso

of Mike Tyson as a rippling flag of black ink.

Havana is a cigar end glowing red at night.

Cuba has become the taste of rum mixed

with sour sweat, where America pokes

its fat pistol against the skull of Fidel

and spins the barrel — click, click, boom.

Rust defines the tinpot grog-dens of kava,

and those casbahs of Noumean Napoleons.

Papuans bare hearts to flames of loggers;

rare turtle shells stacked like trash vanish;

the sea pours from a beggar’s up thrust hand.

Suva’s a flaking ceiling of candlenut soot;

dawn’s mouth is burnt peanut ash spat out.

Honululu is a cemetery of suncream-white sand;

plantations grow totem poles for gene...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title
• Title Page
• Acknowledgements
• Table of Contents
• ONE SIRENS
• TWO DRUMS
• THREE MESSAGE STICKS
• FOUR TRUMPETS
• FIVE TONES
• SIX PULSE
• OCCASIONAL NOTES
• Copyright