Stuart Barnes
the moon was consumed with
consuming their own stomach.
Was not, as custom held, consumed by fire
Things are consumed.
Are capable of consuming an entire ampersand in such-and-such
An orange, consumed
sweet machines, powerless, consumed,
only want that wire song later to floss with, when civilized nights of too much consumer discount
Have made more ruin than Heaven’s consuming flame;
a fire consuming all obsequious delay,
A Thorstein Veblen moment of conspicuous consumption:
No smoking No alcohol consumption No graffiti
•
net, for others to consume, a fish-poem
and call it ‘Happy Holiday, my Good Consumer!’—
& cheer, consuming yourself like a mortgage
close in to consume the afterbirth.
in a pita, and consume all you will and wish
Of soul-consuming care!
Corrode, consume.
consume drugs by the metric ton
consume each other’s salt.
be consummated. Let the
Will bring Consumption or an Ague quaking,
The purity of the flame in which the most limpid diamonds are consumed
note: a cento from Etel Adnan’s from The Spring Flowers Own: “The morning after / my death”, Peter Goldsworthy’s ‘Acid’, Rosemary Dobson’s ‘A Letter to Lydia’, Sandra Simonds’ ‘Landscape Made From Egg And Sperm’, Clark Moore’s ‘Ampersands’, Dahlia Ravikovitch’s ‘The Love of an Orange’ (translated by Chana Bloch), Mark Doty’s ‘Sweet Machines’, Samuel Wagan Watson’s ‘Booranga Wire Songs’, A. D. Hope’s ‘Country Places’, John Matthias’ ‘After Quevedo’, Imru’Al-Qays’ ‘Mu’allaqa’, Stuart Barnes’ ‘another journey by train’, Isaac Rosenberg’s ‘On Receiving News of the War’, Edward Dorn’s ‘Ode on the Facelifting of the “statue” of Liberty’, W. D. Snodgrass’ ‘Heart’s Needle’, Rigoberto González’s ‘Unpeopled Eden’, Amit Majmudar’s ‘Twin Gluttons’, Christina Rossetti’s ‘Goblin Market’, Diane Fahey’s ‘Winter Solstice’, John Tranter’s ‘The Alphabet Murders’, John Forbes’ ‘Speed, a Pastoral’, Corey Mesler’s ‘Let the Light Stand’, Anne Bradstreet’s ‘A Dialogue between Old England and New’, Manuel Bandeira’s ‘O Último Poema’ (trans. Elizabeth Bishop)
Stuart Barnes was born in Hobart, Tasmania, and lives in Rockhampton, Queensland. His first poetry collection, Glasshouses (UQP 2016), won the Thomas Shapcott Prize, was commended for the Anne Elder Award and shortlisted for the Mary Gilmore Award. From 2013–2017 he was poetry editor for Tincture Journal. stuartabarnes.wordpress.com / @StuartABarnes
