Art/TEXT 2010 10 Artists response to writers

The Table

So many colours. Each with value. Scattered around the table. Six chairs, Six players, One winner. Beer for some,Water for others,Will you play serious? Or just for fun?

Jake

Quiet and unpredictable. No knowledge available to others. He waits patiently. Engages when necessary. The quiet achiever.

Jack

The smart one. Doesn’t play much. Doesn’t need to. Oh so relaxed. Everything is under control. Fear the brain but utilise the arrogance.

Jesse

Everyone knows he’s there. In everything, All or nothing.What will he do? When will he do it? Not the brightest but this is his advantage.

Justin

The textbook. Poised, planned, predictable. Plays to win. Always gets close. Read the example then complete the exercise. Practice makes perfect.

Brett

Has style and the image. Loves to be the image, Seductive play with productive results. Take the bait but don’t be the catch.

Michael

Laugh out loud! Is this a game or is it a joke? First comes the beer. Is that a bluff? What is he doing? I know I can beat that, But why does he always beat me?

Evan Winterburn

Art/TEXT 2010 10 Artists response to writers

The River Runs

Together we sit in the new cafe,
Same foundations, smaller building,
Everything changed after the flood.
Arifin and Sharon moved away
Colin and Felix are here somewhere,
Indra’s ghost still walks the river.

Arifin used to be the spirit of the town,
But after the flood moved out of town,
He turned to god,
Bred some fish
Chased tail in the city,
Before finding an island to spread his roots
There he met someone and married,
He still dreams of the river
But she could never live there.

Sharon tried to make it in the city nearby
But she grew bored and flew away
Like a bird
One day unwittingly found herself nesting
She said it could never stop her travelling,
We haven’t seen her since.

Colin and Felix are playing snooker,
Both still bachelors but older
Now they must think about their families and futures
Their hearts grow heavier
Their eyes don’t shine like they used to.
Work is scarce , less tourists, fewer oragutan.
They live under the spell of a struggling paradise,
Roll it up and smoke it,
Play another round of billiard.

Indra Indra
So kind and handsome
made many dreams come true
went missing in the flood.
Two weeks later they found him
hand in hand with this brother
hey only knew it was him because of the coconut necklace he wore.
His inn is rebuilt now run by family
There you’ll find a small boy
With his eyes and his name.

Mica Cochrane

Art/TEXT 2010 10 Artists response to writers

Red Wine and Gaffa Tape

Emily’s farewell night started out with dinner, just one glass of red, and a role of gaffa tape. Before long we were all topless, jiggling homemade boobie-tassles, gaffa taping skin and drawing fake moustaches on each other, shameless as the Virgin Mary.

Mica Cochrane

Art/TEXT 2020 10 Artists response to writers

Freedom

Whenever in life there is freedom from the world, the mind keeps looking for another excuse, another obligation, another captivation to tangle the soul into another chain of this world. Even the monks, who make a choice to leave this world and chose solitude, are they not making a choice of captivation?

Sarwat Maqbool

Art/TEXT 2010 10 Artists response to writers

Into white

Strange reflections, bound in weaponry
left to dissolve in an endless wallow of white.

Philip Mudin

Art/TEXT 2010 10 Artists response to writers

Gateway

This is both a gateway and a prison
by thoughts I inflect a structure by which to hang stars
A machine to churn galactic mist into
symbols that bleed signatures of angels.
Worship this manifestation of devastating truth
that there be no other devil of casket intrusion.

By upward defining transgressions
of duplicitous carcinogens …
behold I am a disease called life
slowly consuming its own essence
arriving back at the beginning
to find I have gone nowhere
but inside my mind’s eye to fall
into reality once again;

A sign incomplete
A sound stopped mid sentence
A wound scabbed over only to be reinfected.

Philip Mudin

Art/TEXT 2010 10 Artists response to writers

I want to kiss your hand

which writes poems

out of my loveletter

by letter crafting

my emotions

eternal

Sarwat Maqbool