PEOPLE LIVE HERE by RISE AGAINST Poem by Murray Taylor

 

A shitty unit in Brisbane, Summer 2016

Post-Modern Nostalgia

 

We talked at a party uninvited.

You said you were sixteen to be legal,

I did it to seem cool.

We walked home to music few heard,

Blasting from our tinny phone speakers.

Too inexperienced to taste watered down beer,

Or perform perfect first kisses.

 

We weren’t ones for cliché,

Unless performed ironically.

Weeks drift by,

The comfort of familiar phrases,

Of gestures and faces,

Had us dancing in moonlight

Or sharing spaghetti.

Ironically.

 

That song played.

Not one of love and folly,

But of international war,

Politics, tyranny.

Of a heroine distraught

By the slaughter of orphans.

Yet, despite the grotesque images,

We sang.

 

An eerie comfort from confronting conflict.

Knowledge that awful realities

Were recognised by more than us.

An awful subject,

but calming verses

Of disaster and injustice

Put us to sleep.

 

You moved away,

But who moved first.

“I’ll love you forever”

Or for eighteen months.

We both had our scars,

Our mistakes,

Which drove us apart.

 

There were times I forgot you

And our song.

Then, there were times

Where slurpee stains,

Still adhered to my passenger seat,

Brought memories of you,

Forgotten between exams.

 

Lives went by.

You were married with kids,

I was married with dogs.

I vowed to love her forever,

It’s been twenty months now.

An old friend,

A cousin of yours,

Shared photos of your third pregnancy.

 

You seem happier,

As genuine as social media allows.

Did you ever,

When tasting cheap beer,

Get pulled into the nostalgia

Of a fleeting romance?

Of more ambiguous times?

 

The journey continued,

I scrolled through your feed.

Catching up on missed moments

From your personal streaming service.

I almost messaged you,

When I stopped on your lowest point.

Almost.

 

Was this right?

It felt perverse,

To corrupt my thoughts,

With dreams of forgotten days.

A frame halts on your tattoo,

A verse from our song.

 

Would your newborn hear,

That tune of tragedy?

Does it differ from the classics?

A tradition of bittersweet melodies,

Of melancholic baritones,

While the cycle continues.

 

 

Stereo Story #658