1967-71
apprentice
fitter and turner

relationships

pressures

pleasures

daily morning story,
bedroom or workshop -
i must choose

dawn vice?

First published by Emerald Publishers
(#3 of ‘3 workplace poems’)
in “Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal”,
March 2020

Note: the Australian product mentioned in “Dawn – Australia” alluded to as ‘dawn vice’ belongs to Dawn Australia who make a bench vice suited to mechanical operations in workshops.

steadfastly
crowds flock
to showgrounds
for the carousel
the roundabout
that merry-go-round
or the whirly-gig
inveigled
by colours
lights
and confident showmen
where for small change
your shared ride
can transact
a brief
intimate encounter

in a classic dream chase

First published, ‘Flashes of Brilliance’
https://www.flashesofbrilliance.org/poetry-circular-economy-geoffrey-aitken/
edited by Darren White (US), March 2020

the trick it seems
is to sleep on it,
overnight it
in such a fashion
that by dawn
and your rising,
it has disappeared
ethered,
vanished,
dissolved and

you can go about your business,
guilt free

First published by Human Rights Australia at ‘Right Now’
March 2019 edited by Sara Navissi
http://rightnow.org.au/creative-works/for-others/

he has a focus
an interest he follows
a quarrelsome curiosity
without a job description
no career pathway
changeable direction but
unclear reasoning by the privileged
has placed them in his sights
their birth right, an unjustifiable advantage
and he wants to bring them down
scoffs at their life permit
because drudgery is his hump/humour
schooled on disadvantage with daily reinforcement
shop floor brutality and poor monetary reward (at best)
the Australian dream – unobtainable
and the divide grows as he breathes
he has friends/acquaintances/co-conspirators
whose lives are filled with animosity
longing primarily for that level playing field
where heritage does not apply
and thoughts/ideas are considered/debated/adopted
from free agents
not just a single vote dealt unfairly
because he wants parity
this is his dream, down in the bilge/the hole/the fundament/the pit
the centrality/the essence of his life’s direction/desires/vision

as his is an increasingly unacknowledged voice

desperation stakes -
breakout politics or break-in criminality

First published by Friendly Street Poets in ‘New Poets 19’ edited by
Edie Eicas in 2018. With a nod to Alan Morrison editor ‘Militant Thistles’ (UK)

it’s old
before it reaches me
i’m told

the light
the day
the news
the conversation

there’s warmth though
and daylight hours are favourable
still dealing a life force
measured sometimes, in moments

and so
i make the fickleness last
etch notes in my journal
ignore life’s frailty
expand the impermanence
until i have possessed
the full day
calling it mine

as if it were mine to own

First published, ‘Friendly Street Anthology 42’ “Dream-Water Fragment”, 2018
Edited by Karl Cameron-Jackson and Ros Schulz
and then by ‘In Case Of Emergency Press’, “One Surviving Poem 1”,
2019 (AUS) edited by Howard Firkin.

on those athletic blocks
keenly balanced
expectantly alert
she knew
her training would propel her
down that track
the moment
the starter’s pistol fired
but she also knew
there was a choice
a contested decision
regarding those left behind
and
the obligation
and insistence

others must follow

First published by, ‘Sparks of Calliope’
https://sparksofcalliope.wordpress.com/2020/05/28/the-after-by-geoffrey-aitken/
edited by Randal Burd, May 2020