Like Pink Sweets

Q. what fuels a human?
A. pain, of course

nothing but.

and

like pink
sweets

it
gets shared

plenty...

------------------------------

the last job I had (I)

the last job I had
was at a phone company,
and I really didn't do much,

neither did the others...

as soon as the boss & his sidekick
headed upstairs for lunch
we'd all start playing networked computer games,
sometimes there'd be 6 of us playing in the office

and there we were...

forgetting our work,
forgetting the vice around our temples & balls

for just
a while.

------------------------------

the last job I had (II)

the last job I had
was at a phone company,
and I really didn't do much,

as soon as I arrived for work,
I'd head up for breakfast
where this large, smiling black woman

would serve me up
a hot one:

baked beans
sausages
scrambled eggs
hashed browns

all of these
would be plopped
onto the plate

and while this was happening
I'd stare at the movements beneath her top
& wonder how large her tits were.

I went up to that buffet for hot breakfast as often as I could
and then one day I began to notice

movements beneath my top
while walking down the stairs
to the office

I paused
and touched myself,

I found that I'd piled on enough pork
that I was growing a fine set of tits myself!

but they were nothing
to my imagination

of what
that black woman had.

Sharing white chocolate at Felixstowe Railway Station

we
saw her today:

my
girlfriend's mum.

her memory's ok,
but her legs shake a little

and there were a lot of silences
in that small room

with
1 tv,

a lot of silences
between mother

&
daughter.

and during one of these silences
I gazed at a b&w
photo

of the
long-dead husband

while
mother and daughter
stare at each other

and there's no talk,
we don't want to upset death
in this place with talk

and he was there,

him
with his
sweet, sickly smell

here,
in the old people's home

death
is the patron,

but
I don't mind old people's homes,

if it's
only just to visit

at 29 years of age

as I tend to get a message
loud & clear

when I leave
a place like that...

^

Biography

Brad Evans was born in Sydney, 1971. He was placed into various educational institutions for twenty years, finally escaping in 1997 when poetry became too influential in his life. Some of his latest poems, articles, interviews, and reviews have been, or will soon be, featured in the following magazines (printed / online) and anthologies: Driftnet (UK), Open Window (CAN), Slacker (UK), Niederngasse (GMNY), The Scriberazone (UK), La Petit Zine (US), Zine Zone (UK), Struggle (US), Centoria (AUST), Lateral Moves (UK), Wonderlust (UK), Poetry DownUnder (AUST), The Animist (AUST), Angel (UK), The Brobdingnagian Times (EIRE), Skald (UK), Breakfast All Day (UK / FR), Konfluence (UK), Paris / Atlantic (FR), Sivullinen (FNLD), Asphyxia (AUST), Quantum Leap (UK), Hobo (AUST), Ygdrasil (CAN), Dancing Barefoot (BELG), & (AUST), Apples & Oranges (US), Hjokfinnies Sanglines (UK), Panic! (UK), Roadworks (UK), Markings (UK), Haggard & Halloo (US), Voices of Liberation (UK), Rising (UK), Black Spring Review (US), Fire (UK), Manifold (UK), Lochs (UK), In Our Own Words (US), Cordite (AUST), Borderlines (UK), Zimmerzine (UK), Insurgentz (US), Braquemard (UK), Community of Poets (UK), Papillon (UK), At Last (UK), Poezine (UK), Big Bridge (UK).