Willow dreams 
turned to Ashes
On patches of 
packed earth
Down under

While hope pitched up 
On treacherous sands 
With fiery wingtips
In the ceasefire acts 
of a Bondi Bond,
who goes by another
name, that on most days  
prompts virtual outrage 
and random searches 
(That’s what’s in a name, 
Ye old rhetorical Bill,
the gulf between an ex-pat
And an immigrant
that no small boat can cross.
if you really must know)

And yet, as pretend lines
are crossed on this spinning 
Orange, my papers change 
colour though mine remains
the same, for
I never thought 
I had a certain hue, 
until sterile square boxes 
on White paper ticked me
into one to know my place

Home is a place where 
palm leaves fan paddy fields
Where singing Santas come
With pasty white face masks 
and skinny brown arms
Where festive season is 
every month with different
colours that can
always bleed to Red if
not handled with care

Home is where the return 
ticket takes you now,
Where the inbound flight
moved you in time lapse,
Into the EU queue,
and then, 
out again

Home is where you 
buy houses and fill
them with trinkets
and people to make
them homes, leaving
just enough jostling
space on a dusty 
garage shelf 
for other hats
you once wore

Better than the crown 
for that carpenter’s Son
who wore a darker shade
of pale than faith allows
for some 

Did he build things of Great
Beauty with his father’s craft?
Or is Faith all that he crafted,
wrapped, of all things, 
In Hope

Faith is whatever it means 
to those who have it 
And while it elevates some 
Into divine grace 
I choose to have it in 
Mankind, with the will
to change worlds before
they too fit into urns

Ashes to Ashes 

Seasons greetings 

one and all