Strange Cargo
by liam Sunday, Jun 2 2013, 9:45am
international / poetry / post

i never did like flying
it’s the most restrictive
form of travel
and here we are
in 2013 -- u would think
things would have improved

what happened to those early
days, fresh cooked hot meals
an assortment of drinks
and a proper in-flight bed
-- tho today’s female attendants
do their best to compensate
for lost luxuries?

but it’s not the same,
luxury sacrificed for profit --
the affluent are forced to purchase
their own jets to fly in luxury

damned commercial world
and its tortures,
the more ‘labour-saving
conveniences’ we invent
the harder and longer
we seem to work

Australian aborigines
spent an average of three hours
per day ‘working,’ the remainder
they spent in ritual, dance
and dreaming;
their history is ‘recorded’
in desert overhangs
and caves
a history of creativity and harmony
with the land that sustained them

what have we lost cramming
into flying aluminium (cigar) tubes
-- sardine airways?

the PA announces my flight

i am ten kilos (and a probing stare)
overweight again
i offer to pay the excess,
a boring routine,

fools

[the red centre is cool tonight
flickering faces and smiling eyes
gathered round the campfire --
the murmur and harmony
of tribal song is carried
on the breeze]