blue seas, green islands–
the governance manipulator’s dream of
paradise, the high ride on the wave
from grass to greenback on the tropic
cancer of poverty–
and in Australia the downers
(put them down and keep them down,
extract the juices from the ripened flesh
of the socially engineered to be exploited
and make them pay for the privilege)
spout fancy rhetoric
to the gullible about the betrayal
of democracy, about sanctions for sins
as if God alone, through the agency of his
corporate deputies, has given holy unction
to their own dis-graces;
and in Fiji
and Samoa and Tonga and the Solomons
the rich blue/green carpet of the Pacific
laid out under the throne of governance
where the coloniser sits, is wearing thin–
its patience threadbare; and once the strong
rough fibre of its weave is exposed it becomes
abrasive to walk on
with soft, white feet clad only
in the paper-thin currency
of words

Jennifer Kemarre Martiniello

 

Jennifer Kemarre Martiniello is an award winning visual artist, poet and writer of Aboriginal (Arrernte), Chinese and Anglo-Celtic descent. Her poetry, prose and essays have been published in journals and anthologies nationally and internationally including in the Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature.

© 2020