CREATIVES

THE CREATURES

The creatures were crying

Lured by food

All for the invasion Of outsiders like me

The creatures were crying

But no one could hear

As we dirtied their water

And broke their fins

The creatures were crying

And so was I

As I participated in the madness

All for the satisfaction

Of seeing them in the wild

The creatures were crying

Please leave us alone

And yet we came there in drones

Picture after picture

Boat after boat

I thought it would be beautiful

But it was so sad

We take so much from these creatures

With which we share our home

I am scared we will take

Until they are all gone

We poison the water

We poison the air

So much destruction

And no one seems to care

The creatures are crying

And so am I

As I participate in the madness

by Austin Lankford

BLACK POPPIES

You see the hearts of our passed brothers and sisters

have fed the poppies blooming on their graves

– nameless in valour as in death.

But for all the red poppies in Flanders Fields

there are those that don’t get to flower

– black in nature and in name.

The first blood of this nation left to die,

to be forgotten underneath a field of red poppies

– never to have their stories told.

Their graves are marked instead by inverted flowers,

poppies growing black beneath the surface,

roots twisted around their hearts and heads

– much like the red poppies flowering above.

How could we turn our backs?

We’ve forgotten the blood of the first,

we’ve forgotten what they sacrificed

for a country that beat them red.

I’m not asking for us to forsake the red poppies

on the memorial walls, but to give

our hearts and heads to the black poppies –

to remember their petals and their fall.

In my dreams I see my grandmother,

the Yuin blood flowing through her veins,

talking to me as she places a single black poppy in a vase.

by Rhys Smith

THE SMOKE ASCENDS FOREVER

It was said a long time ago,

That there is a time for everything.

Whether now is the time no one can say.

Lady Time alone knows, she waits for that day.

The formerly flickering flame of the miner’s lamp,

Now paints the sky red with its radiance.

Fire, flood, famine; no survival.

These riders signal the inevitable arrival.

A voice cries out in the desert wasteland,

‘The time is now! The end is here!’

The modern Millerites assemble, the prophecy is sure.

We will all soon share the Disappointment of 1844.

Is this the time? Or is there another?

Of course not. There is no other chance.

Yet Lady Time, looking up from her watch, in an unheard plea,

Stares wistfully towards a future which only she can see.

by John Gallimore

HEADACHE

I woke up today with a headache. Just a dull thumping at the front of my head, a toddler bashing its fists against the wall of my forehead.

Face washed, get changed, coffee down, gotta keep moving. Every step around the kitchen, every turn of my head really enraged that fucking toddler. Where are its parents? Thump, thump, thump, like a hangover but without the fun night before.

There’s blood on my toothbrush. I was brushing too hard, or maybe it was the cut on my lip? No time, gotta keep moving.

Metro’s packed, Opal gates jammed. Lost my concession Opal last week. God damn adult cards are expensive, god damn adulthood is expensive. Gotta buy more toothpaste, gotta buy some Panadol, gotta top up my Opal card, gotta ask for more shifts, gotta do that reading, gotta do that quiz. Gotta get rid of this headache.

Train’s late. ‘I’m More relaxed now’ brags the broken metro gate. Good for you, I’m running late for class in Y3A and my head is pounding right now, almost like a stake being pushed right back into my skull. Doesn’t matter, gotta keep moving.

Tute then lecture, then lecture, then study, then work, then all over again tomorrow. My favourite lecturer is away sick and the mature-aged student at the front won’t stop asking questions that don’t matter and everyone sounds like white noise, just different pitches of white noise, and not the nice kind that you fall asleep to, the grating, droning kind that really shoves that stake right into the stem of my brain. Doesn’t matter, gotta keep moving. My head is killing me now.

Not enough time to study between classes and work, not enough work to pay my rent, not enough time at home to justify my rent. It’s okay, just find a seat at the library, class is over no, get that reading done, order that new concession card, gotta keep moving. C

an’t find a seat in the library. Fucking high schoolers. I’m sticky and hot from the walk and the library air con is never cool enough and god damn my head is splitting now, like a miner who’s struck gold in my frontal lobe, chipping straight through to my cranial sutures.

Find a seat in the silent space but the person across from me is talking on the phone, and of course they’re a fucking first year. Probably used to study here in year 12. Fucking high schoolers. My cranial sutures are coming undone in violent, hammering strikes.

AskMQ is down of course. I missed a quiz last night, 15%. Is that blood? It’s not from my lip, it must be my head. Sounds about right with the miner hammering so hard. Rent is late, never enough shifts, never enough time, I missed that bloody quiz, bloody idiot.

Why isn’t the first year noticing the blood? Oh god, the pressure’s starting, bursting my eardrums, the top of my head, the front of my head, I think my skull’s about to explode, why isn’t she noticing? Head in hands, please don’t explode, that’d be so embarrassing. Don’t wanna end up on MQ Love Rants.

“To the cute stressed boy in the library whose grey matter hit me in the eye – love react for a dm ;)”

Pop.

Skull bone, brain, hair, blood, arteries, the miner, the toddler, the stake, all explode outward, upward, onto the first year and her pristine AirPods, onto my screen with the AskMQ error message, onto silent space sign, it’s everywhere. I’m bound to cop a fine. Oh god, I don’t have the money for that.

The first year, why isn’t she noticing? She’s still talking to her friend, AirPods still in her ears. No-one’s noticing, no-one’s paying attention, like they’ve all got their own headaches. I walk around and pick up pieces of my viscera and shove it in all my bag because maybe the librarians won’t notice if I clean everything up real quick and leave? Why hasn’t that bloody first year noticed yet?

God, I’m so tired. Go home, lie down. Wake up when it’s dark, forget to eat, forget to do my quiz, forgot to go to work. Sleep bad, sleep stressed. Wake up with a headache. Do it all over again.

by Steph McCarthy-Reece