1. |
Just spinning wheels
05:01
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I shouldn’t bend your ears too much, it’s all to the good.
I shan’t delve too deeply here, it’s all to the good.
When you wake up you won’t see me there,
I’ve pulled up my socks and walked away.
Standing on the tilting wind-gnarled edge,
We are spent, we’ve been had.
Would it do well to break ties?
We are spent, a bob each way.
For it’s clear we’re just spinning wheels.
To whom are you sending wince-inducing notes? It’s all to the good.
Any day now she’ll be out of your mind! It’s all to the good.
When the pencil dust has settled,
There’ll be no more words spoken on the stump.
Things turn bitter in my mouth,
And to ashes in my hands.
The past before us stuck its head out
And now it’s being chopped off.
For it’s clear we’re just spinning wheels.
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2. |
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The Tempe water tower hangs in the distance
It’s five o’clock fast and the 422 is a-missing
I studied my feet and made play with my glasses
A statue of patient bronze
The timetable says 4:27
Shall I knot my hands or let them run heavy?
No person to whom
I could unbend my mind
I should have stayed at the club
Within the ambit of fun
What did you meet the one who saw that:
If I could summon the ghosts of the Coptic church down the highway
Will they bless the cotton socks of the 422?
I sharpened my teeth and waited at the bus top
Slouching towards Tempe Jets
I can feel my hair grow dank in the salt air
Shall I prove my mettle and go the whole hog?
No person to whom
I could unbend my mind
I should have stayed at the club
Within the ambit of fun
What did you meet the one who saw that:
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3. |
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She went upstairs with a cold laugh
That did not extend to her eyes.
The union, oh, they called a strike
And her husband he crossed the picket line.
Her husband he went upstairs too
Saying: “Honey, oh, honey, what troubles you?
The union, oh, they called a strike
But I needed the money, pocket your doubts.”
She said: “It’s high time that you learned,
Solidarity means you take care of your own.
If the union, oh, they call a strike,
You spin idle or you stay at home!
They cut our wages and conditions,
The bosses fell over themselves in joy.
The union, then, they called a strike,
And we’ll hold out and put up a fight.
From my mouth to god’s ears,
The wildcat workers laid a picket down.
They organised and made their demands,
For united we bargain, divided we beg.”
Her husband he came home from work
Saying: “Where’s my honey? She seems so hurt.”
He went upstairs with pleas and excuses,
Quisling is as strikebreaker does.
She said: “A spade is a spade
And a scab is a scab;
Oh, if only the shame
Could act as a salve.”
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4. |
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The first cold tussle of the pre-dawn light,
The street lamp still winks its beam.
Most buildings were tumbledown,
His boots were down at hill.
It’s hardly news that the job is gone,
He feels it with no good grief.
It’s time to tighten up the belt,
He feels it keenly and bewails it bitterly.
With a twinkle and a longing,
He looks for vacancies and openings.
A living wage slakes the thirst,
Pays the bills and keeps the pot boiling.
Spare a thought for the down and out,
The low paid and the hard up.
If they can’t make both ends meet,
They sleep afraid and wake afraid.
If we stumble backwards into the future,
That won’t do us no good.
We need to weave a tangle,
Then cut the system at the joints.
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5. |
Botany Bay
05:50
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On the clay brick fence he sat, waiting for the plane to pass;
You can’t talk over that.
The sombre browns and terra cotta were hot to the touch.
And the grinding white light of the Sydney summer swept away at Botany Bay.
The wind leapt out of the bushes, the sky was oddly beclouded,
The heat was blowing a gale.
His eyes, suffused with dryness, the sun pinked his cheeks.
And back and forth, hither and yon, the planes edged away from Botany Bay.
It’s getting hot out here, the air is baking the insects,
But inside it seems so much worse.
The fan is off until payday, at least I have half a meal in the fridge.
And the poor are too poor to die, at least so they say in Botany Bay.
The heat played the heavy but the cause was known:
It was entirely man made.
Examples are legion, if we look: we are flaying the planet.
And as the excuses rang hollow, the pollution did splay out of Botany Bay.
Playing with the climate is an old game, it’s never won;
Oh lord, here comes a plane again.
What with one thing and another, we need to get off the coalface.
And therein lies the task ahead: avoid laying waste to Botany Bay.
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6. |
Those of finer clay
05:06
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There goes a question, it has me up in arms, well may we say my foil is with whom? When the public thunder, the guns stay silent, but this adage can be inverted too.
It ain’t necessary to belabour the point, for we are not burdened by a servile character. What’s that you said, oh, to be sure you have a healthy disrespect for authority.
Sing me of the lay of the land,
We can take care of ourselves,
We don’t need those of finer clay.
Let’s not beat our chests too loudly about, our eyes may be in the heavens but our feet are still in the muck. If we organise together, help each other out, change will come like a thief in the night.
One could quip that politics is a shadow cast by big business on society. The party line is always moving in a circle, for they don’t differ but in name.
Sing me of the lay of the land,
We can take care of ourselves,
We don’t need those of finer clay.
We will not go on behaving
Like the audience at the very play
Of which we are the actors.
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7. |
All of a tremble
05:45
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From Launceston to Hobart, sunlight and dappled bark,
Faint bleats of sheep on the highway.
If the bus took a thousand days to reach the foothills of Mount Wellington,
I’d still hug myself with delight.
I’m back to see your hometown, still not without its charm.
Events have passed and left it standing here.
Oh, to see your face once more, flowing smiles and teeming glee
With a bouquet of wine and lancers of fun.
To be sure your life was so paved with good intentions and
Warmhearted and daunted by none.
You always had my back, when I escaped my life you brought me into yours.
I could not be more off my feet swept.
When things went to custard
And my breath was tight in the chest
You’ve passed on
And I went all of a tremble.
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8. |
Nabi Saleh
04:59
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’Twas in the village of Nabi Saleh
Just north of Ramallah
Mustafa on his deathbed lay
His muscles gone to suet
He sent his father to the town
To the place where she was toiling
Saying “You must come to your cousin, dear,
If your name be Ahed Tamimi”
Earning her bread by the sweat of her brow
Her voice fell dead at her feet
She stole away, a-wincing in haste
“Oh, lord, be kind to Mustafa”
He turned his face onto the wall
Where the Green Line snakes its thieving
“Goodbye, goodbye, to my friends all,
Viva la Palestina”
She went outside into the town
Which the boots of soldiers defile daily
She faced one down with nerves of steel
One of many who grasp the nettle
When she drew near there was more than one
Ahed demanded their leaving
A scuffle broke, a soldier slapped
Next morning she woke in a gaol cell
“Mother, oh, mother, if they dig my grave,
Make sure it’s both long and narrow
Mustafa died only yesterday
And I may die tomorrow
“But mother, oh, mother, we don’t suffer alone,
But we suffer just the same
Until we win, when the occupation is gone,
Viva la Palestina.”
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Bud Petal Sydney, Australia
Bud Petal’s music has been described as “cerebral art-folk”, “a true outsider, a freak-folk wunderkind”.
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