gangway #9

David Hopkinson
Virtual Offerings

© 1998 by David Hopkinson and gangan books australia


On the Motorway of Life

On the motorway of life
I shall rest my weary wheels
At your service station

I shall drink
From the waters
Of your automatic Coke dispenser

And take nourishment
From your plastic, greasy
Artificially sweetened, mass produced

Over-processed, chemically enhanced
Additive-enriched, portion-controlled
Nutrition-free apology for food

Groaning in agony
I shall join the queue
For your stomach pump

Catering by Trust House Forte
Salmonella from corporate sources
THF means instant death
Death by unnatural causes

On the motorway of life
I shall stop to smell the roses
And bring my own sandwiches.

 


No Parachute Supplied

From the disco bars of Bangkok
To the disUnited States
On the streets of Kings Cross
The sacrament awaits
In pubs and clubs in old Soho
Take a ghost train ride
To needle park a go-go
The seductive suicide

Smuggled in through the front door
Smuggled in through the back
Banks and finance houses
Become high street laundromats
The alchemist's white powder
Always takes first prize
In the race for self-deception
The daily suicide

Conjuring up the dragon
Hunters to the chase
Desperate for admission
Through the Pearly Gates
Aspiring to oblivion
Expiring from inside
Like Icarus before them
No parachute supplied

A chemical solution
Salvation by syringe
Behind life's lonely prison door
Death eternal springs
Nailed up on the steely cross
With needles crucified
Rushing headlong to embrace
The final suicide.

 


The author writes a seduction manual in the Job Centre

Hey baby, I'm an astrologer
I watch the stars and signs
I foresee a good position
The horizontal kind

Hey baby, I'm a palmist
With devious designs
Let me hold your hands
I'll read between the lines

Hey baby, I'm a doctor
Curing all your ills
Prescribing a dose of debauchery
And contraceptive pills

Hey baby, I'm a conjuror
Magic's my career
You give me your virginity
I'll make it disappear

Hey baby, I'm a preacher
Your body I'll consecrate
Confession time is 8 till 9
Sinning's 9 till 8

Hey baby, I'm a poet
Courting your applause
Unzipping the jeans of your fantasies
With my metaphors

Hey baby, I'm an accountant
At figures I excel
Like 38-24-36
And 69 as well

Hey baby, I'm a mechanic
I'll make your engine feel alright
I suggest a fuel injection
With high octane dynamite

Hey baby, I'm an astronomer
You're a super constellation
Show me your heavenly body
I'll show my appreciation.


E-mail davidhop@rabbit.com.au