Tom Spence
Over lightning ridge
Twelve string jingle, min-min light
Blue enamel sky

As the train pulls in
Graphite angels come to roost
On rooftops down the coast

Vale Cassius Clay
Butterfly sting like a bee
​Muhammed Ali


Pete Seeger is gone
Gone to flowers everyone
Will they ever learn

Bowie
Put on your red shoes
We're coming to town bip-bip!
Poor little greenie

​Took it all too far
Making love with his ego
But boy could he play

Ashes to ashes
Want an axe to break the ice
​Planet Earth is blue

BB King

Why I sing the blues?
I been around a long time
Really paid my dues

Alan Rickman

Bowie and Rickman
Legacy in synthesis
​'We can be villains"

Joni Mitchell

We had a purpose
When all we ever wanted
Came in from the cold

Robin Williams

Making people laugh
Depriving yourself of air
It's the same release

Great comedians
Always wrestling with demons
Glad I'm not funny

Guy Fawkes
This terrorist guy
Inspiring pyrotechnics
I can't remember

George Jones in heaven
Driving a stolen chariot
​To the nearest bar

Gene Wilder
If you want to view
Wilder imagination
Simply look around

Al Jarreau
Like a diamond ring
lost just before Valentine's
Al Jarreau is gone

Richard Adams
Heart with the thousands
my Friend stopped running today
Animality

Carrie Fischer
Surrender the pink
We have no time for sorrows
you're my only hope
Orlando
Promises of peace
What becomes of a rainbow
When our colors bleed?


Christmas Island
Cry, the disempowered
Those who perish on the seas
Those who watch, helpless

Sandy Hook
Peaceful arms must bear
Greed, the madman's armourer
Spent rounds, empty rooms

In our arms we bear
Chaff of the gunman's harvest
​Falling as spent rounds

Aurora
Tragic aftermath
Aurora, Colorado
​ A spike in gun sales


Prince
Artist, formerly
Laughing in the purple rain
Just like his mother

Cleo

Cleo set to fold
Jack Thompson inspired miscue
Cleo centrefold

​​Ronnie Corbert
My Grandfather's house
Kero heater and TV
That Two Ronnies sketch

Bob Ellis is dead
Speaking for the great unwashed
Not known for washing

Khun Krit
When the cold wind blows
I've seen fire and I've seen rain
Pieces on the ground

Mr Gore Vidal
Thinking man's American
 Has gone, unpunished 


Gough Whitlam
Do not go gently
Rage, maintain your rage against
Dying of the light

Vale Ornette Coleman
Harmolodic Pearly Gates
​Angels look askance
​
​Michael Brown
One who fired the gun
Only a pawn in their game
​His epitaph plain

Vale Johnny Winter
Down on highway sixty-one
Blue men sing the whites

Third brother of five
Crossed One-hundred and tenth street
Vale Bobby Womack

James Cruikshank
O-week '93
Watching how this bloke could smoke
While nailing a riff

George Michael
Sun gone down on me
I'm never gonna dance again
you gotta have faith
Maya Angelou
I know why the caged bird sings
Still, like air, I rise

9/11
Eleven years on
Acts slip into history
Castles made of sand

Darrell Lea's gone bust
End of a long dark journey
​Down a Rocky Road


Remember Biko
Lived the struggle for freedom
Died in custody

Peaches Geldof
Their own little girl
They can see no reasons 'cause
There are no reasons

Vale Bernie McGann
Reeds bend in the southerly
Waiting for the post

Vale Seamus Heaney
Commit him to the constancy
Of the acid bog

Ray Manzarek dies
Inspiring one last tirade
Purple poetry

​Phil Everly's dead
Mum's on the phone looking for 
Twenty Golden Greats

Nelson Mandela
Any means necessary
Armed struggle or love

Bob Brozman, bluesman
Grasped world harmony as if
Holding an orange

Robert Hughes is dead
I liked most of his statements
​ Bar the racism

Michael Jackson
Archangel Michael
Forever battling demons
Man in the mirror

Melbourne cup
Michelle Payne romps home
Liberal feminism
Flogging a live horse

Anghkor Wat
Those who chose such stone
For all it could endure
​Perceived the future?

London, MAY 2013
Prayers for Londoners
Our teachers and peacemakers
When hate walks the streets

Guernica bombed
​The abstract met the stuka
A lifetime ago

Margaret Thatcher
Remember. One should never
Speak ill of the dead

Les Murray
Men must have legends
Chopping into the stillness
Echo and silence

This is for Morse Code
And the quality of sprawl 
And for spring and hail
​