it’s a lifestyle choice

locked on to my dragon,
pepper-sprayed n wrenched
i’m a concrete warrior, immovable
defending this defenceless pocket
of karri, marri in the black mud
leaf-litter n sticks in my hair
staring up at the canopy at the cloud
under slow fat rain
or embedded in an open frack paddock action
go get an angle grinder to release me
when democracy is relentless, useless
so i’m locking on, again
coz we spoke softly then shouted
to the blind, the pin-striped leaders
the cloth-eared kings
now i’m flat on my back
in a forest of felled ideas
and blunted machinery
so you tear it down around me
your mandate of chainsaw philosophy
and i’m locking on
coz star pickets n chains
on the back o my ute,
i’m arrestable
as the rain smashes in

it’s a lifestyle choice
to live on an island of gas
shaped like wheelbarrow mutiny
waiting for big weather, in a big country
filled with big rocks and big roads
pipelines n cylinders, iron hills n spinifex
and the storm comes slow and low
a fierce spin brews black over broome beaches
like smudged coal at the fuzzy horizon
and as the drenching smashes camp
we dodge airborne speed signs in the gale
track to the wet mess with no beer
in a cat 3 lifestyle

it’s a lifestyle choice
to chase a space rock across the top paddock
the 930 flash at the kings park horizon
or fishing for stars in the swan.
just over the range it fell
she said, we searched til dusk
for the craters, we found rainbows
in the weakening sun
til the crows, the wardongs spoke
and laughed, sang songs about us
about watching fools gather
in the soak of another colourless western sunset,
we reek of lifestyle choices
as horses charge matagarup
one leg deep in the water
and the big rains hit the river
in friday evening waves