O'Connell's Bookshop, 19 Bank Street,

Adelaide SA 5000 - this was the address.

I went to this bookshop

and the bookshop devoured me;

there was an amicable fight -

ink was spilt and words were written.

I enclose those words here below,

addressed to you, dear reader,

within this frame:

After the last book has been burnt,

We will turn to insanity for comfort

After the last page goes up in flames,

We will warm ourselves by lightless fires

(And darkness will be our only light)

After the last word has been written and read,

We will cease to read each other

And then I will wonder at my ignorance,

In this age of perceived omniscience

Knowledge is power, but data is paralysis

Invisible terminators already choke my throat 

(Hark! hear me gasp)

Frankensteins we have so carefully designed,

Rise against us, reach for our minds

(And how the life of my mind is now waning)

Re-remember the temperature, they whisper sweetly, stuttering,

remember, re-remember! 451 in the Fahrenheit scale!

You will not have my attention,

Ubiquitous mirror, mirror on every wall

(Words are fairest of them all)

I choose life over death and words over emptiness

The last gasp of the mind

(The last twist of the knife)

Dead poet, you haunt my poems

(But I haunt my own poems too hahaha

Oh you snob of a poet, you meta-allusionist,

to quote yourself)

incoh

    eren

ce

something eats at my mind

    something

something eats

I cannot think

    think

cannot think

fear gnaws

    only love scares it away

        shakes me out of my mind.

obs

    curi

ty

And "ICTHUS meaning fish,

the word transcendence written in every"

poem:

Et clamor meus ad te veniat

So, then, teach me all the rules of poetry,

So that I may break them.

And teach me all the rules of God,

That I may keep them

Behold my incoherence. I call it poetry

I apologise for the incomprehensible,

I do not blame you,

You would have to read all my poems

To understand this

            one.

I write like a lover to his beloved,

only she gets the joke haha lol

fragm

    entat

ion

here I hide, behind the curtain,

furtively writing poetry.

don't notice me, just look at the words.

switch off the spotlight.

yet you ask:

and why again the wasteland as your backdrop?

because in the land of the dead, life is the resistance

and when darkness falls, light is appreciated

these are my word experiments in the 21st century

where everything goes wrong

because I'm all mixed up

bef

    ore the

des

        cent o

f intol

    erable reg

ret

You modern mirrors will not

    have my attention

I am the bookseller

    of the last million books

I am the reader

    of the last million words

I

    am

the

    resistance

Thus ends the frame. That narrator isn't me okay.

I only spilt the ink.

written by th omas mele th

in the year of my fragmentation,

written for those who would care to read my broken verse.

References / bibliography: Mr. Eliot & myself & the Tridentine Mass

The last gasp of the mind.

I, earth

Do not call me death, I am no murderer

I only claim what was first mine

I, the earth upon which you trudge,

am only an observer. 

From my dust your body first came

and to me your dust will return.

I am layered with time

I do not have myths or legends or memories within me,

But am layered with history, reality, and the lives of many men.

Layered within me are the bodies of all mankind,

Except four, and how could I contain

That fourth one, how could I contain my maker?

How could I, ever changing one, contain the unmoved mover?

How I miss that last one,

How I miss your voice.

Sometimes I hear the chirping of the birds

And wonder if it is you whispering.

I have heard it whispered among mortals

That he remains here still, in another form,

Disguised and veiled.

Oh that I had mortal eyes to see him again!

It has been centuries since I heard his voice.

Back then I could feel him and hear him,

and he was not like the others, he was different -

He cared for me.

I miss him

Is that the chirping of the birds

or is that you whispering?

I miss you

the best thing that happened to me

Amidst the flames of agony and despair,

When all the world burned and all I had was you,

I saw you with me in the flames - 

Oh you did stand by me in the flames -

when I had nothing,

you became everything to me,

and so may it always be

And you, Christ, the best thing that happened to me,

Whispered to me, piercéd heart to broken heart:

"Keep

    your eyes

        on Me,

and I will be enough."

your words not mine

you, God, source of all light,

enlighten this dark whirlwind

of scatteredness that I am,

with your radiant wings, 

shelter me with your truth

enlighten me to divest myself

of all worldly desire,

and engage in the spiritual act 

of composing the written word,

to do the work and leave it unto you,

in the rich tradition 

of Christ the roaring lion of truth and beauty

O Christ, write through me,

and let me care not for money,

fame, publication,

but only for what word you want me 

to write next -

your will not mine

your words not mine

I tried to 

scale Everest,

find treasures,

write epics,

run marathons,

build monuments,

serve kings,

be the best,

but all I was looking for

was a little bit of love

remember me

Give me a list of all the people

who will remember you 

once you are dead and gone,

and I will go through it

and strike out the names one by one

Only God will remember you 

and constantly think of you.

Live for God, not for them

In the evening of my life came Christ the lion

you, my God,

like a blessed flash of lightning,

evade my gaze,

as if blushing, blushing, blushing

for love of me

you my sublimity,

my epiphany,

you shine now, disappear then,

like a fleeting sparkle of the sun 

poured into my blinded eyes,

you the life with which I live,

you the love with which I love,

you the joy with which I rejoice,

you, the love I have searched for 

all my life, though I knew you not,

Jesus -

and thus in the evening of my life

came Christ the lion, 

searching for me who ran from Him,

roaring, roaring, roaring,

in rage against my enemies.

find me, Christ, and let me find you,

for you will not abandon me

***

The phrase 'Christ the lion' is inspired by the poem of T.S. Eliot which says, In the juvescence of my youth came Christ the tiger.

my will be broken

in the forest of experience

the leaves of my heart

rustle wildly in the storm of emotions

the bark of faith keeps me grounded.

reason and actions keep me safe.

for love is an act of the will

even in the dark storms of emotion

and loving God with abandon, with surrender,

is the only way forwards.

my will is stubborn, obstinate, and self-absorbed,

curling in into myself.

break my will, Jesus, and let yours be done

I am free

Sinking in the black quagmire of despair,

in the swamp of anxieties and 

endless self-absorbed thoughts.

Woe, woe, woe is me.

Like broken shards of a faded mirror,

my broken heart lay upon the dismal soil,

endlessly reflecting myself and my brokeness.

Woe, woe, woe is me.

But one hand, wounded, pierced, bleeding for me,

a Man full broken for love of me,

reached for me and rescued me,

placing me upon the mountain of His love.

And He looked into my eyes

and I looked into His,

and so was I redeemed by His love.

I do not worry or fret for tomorrow anymore,

tomorrow's problems are solved by Christ,

God of tomorrow, God of all time.

I think of only the solution not the problem.

You, Lord, are the solution to all my problems,

You are the answer to all my burning questions.

I no longer am bothered

by the dark nights or consoling days.

I no longer look at my brokeness.

I no longer think of myself.

I think of nothing but of God,

I do nothing but love and rejoice and exist in Christ.

For the love of God is mightier than all my brokeness.

I am at peace.

I am free

On my way to church

The sunlight on my face

The light on the city streets

The yellow leaves on the sidewalk

The sudden smell of autumn

The gust of wind rustling the fallen leaves.

On my way to church,

This sudden beauty ambushes me,

With the breathtaking, blinding brilliance

Of the sun at its zenith,

If only for a brief moment.

So too you blaze brilliantly towards me,

In the Eucharist.

Light light light

Lord, thou art light unto my darkness

This is Your love.

This is how You've loved me,

Lord Jesus Christ

Anguished Heart

Today I cried out to myself, and imagined,

(Would it be God telling me something?)

That at my deathbed

I would cry out with anguished heart

That I had not written the words 

God asked me to write

(Or that I had not lived out my days 

In the noble ways 

God asked me to live)

And so I now write, and now live

Before the descent of intolerable regret

Ruminations of a Homesick Poet

I

brain-dump my feelings

and my thoughts

and my worries

onto this page of white. somewhere,

someone, somehow,

has managed to create that

same recognizable sadness in me

that I once felt 

(was it a decade and a half ago?)

when I left one country for another,

leaving all my close friends,

that same gasp of sadness

that I felt on the plane after takeoff

and I realizing that I am now heading

into a life all on my own -

fully supplanted were the ties, the roots,

the friends, the familiarities,

gone at least for now that familiar

sight of pleasant landmarks on the way home

and what is home now

what is

what is home

when all I feel is rootlessness and the 

ruthlessness of a migrant's raw homesickness.

I will soon move on to the next chapter of my life,

and will have to bid farewell to all I have known.

how it hurts

I cannot have what I have always had, forever,

I cannot be where I have always been, forever

I cannot have those who were once my friends

always near me and always friends, forever,

aargh! this I know but how it hurts

how it hurts to let go

of that branch

I have always held, close to my heart,

how it hurts and wounds

my bleeding heart.

presently I am left alone with my thoughts,

or shall I call them emptiness,

and loneliness, and melancholic homesickness -

that homesickness of one 

who constantly longs for home

but belongs nowhere,

uprooted and rootless.

home is for me, it seems at times,

nowhere and never

and do not dismiss this quickly

as the inevitable ruminations

of a melancholic daydreamer

for this is the raw scream and cry 

of a human being who once lived upon this earth -

do not dismiss this my story,

nor dismiss any story,

of any human life upon this earth,

for our songs and hymns are all different,

our journeys look alike but are magnificently different

when we rise to meet God

and journey with him. 

so,

Lord have mercy

    Christ have mercy

Lord have mercy

and I suddenly realise

I can find home

only in You,

God,

if only I would let myself in,

in into Your outstretched arms.

and this strengthens my heart,

and I am suddenly healed, uplifted

I miss my home, my family -

I miss you Appa, I miss you Amma,

I miss you brothers and sisters - 

I miss the friends that have moved on,

and the thought that everything I now know

will soon move on just as

everything I had previously known

has moved on,

intensifies my homesickness

nothing will always be the same,

nothing will always be constant and unchanging,

like the ideal home that I long for,

but You, O Christ Jesus,

You will always be there for me

with Your Love, with Your outstretched arms.

You, Jesus,

    are

        home

Cooking for five on a lazy Sunday arvo

I wake up at 2 pm today. I groan.

I feel so exhausted. 

If I hadn't had to cook for five,

I would've slept much longer.

It has been such a long, tiring week at work,

But I need to do it every week, along with my husband,

To support the kids. My husband's still sleeping - 

Snoring, and my three beautiful kids are lost in their own dreamlands,

Sprawled sleeping on the bed.

As a mother of three, life is hard,

I think to myself, but I can't stop, I have to,

I want to, go on, rain or shine, regardless of how I feel.

Love is an act of the will.

I wish Joshua had woken up early

And prepared some food, but he's still sleeping -

Snoring. I head over to the kitchen with a sigh.

I peel up some potatoes wearily,

Boil them, mash them up,

Get some steak ready, and stir fry some veggies.

I put in some dough I'd prepared the day before

And shove it into the oven to get some bread.

I go to sit a while in the lounge, exhausted.

After more than half hour, the bread ends up burnt and quite horrible.

I look at the burnt bread in my hands,

And then at the spotless host in the hands of Christ,

In the painting of the Last Supper in the dining.

I look at the clock. 4.30 pm. 

I bin the burnt bread, and yell, "Wake up everyone!

Get ready for Mass, quick!"

From the crucifix near the clock,

Christ who can feed more people than there are in the world,

Looks at me with kindness and love.

In the distance, in the town, the church bell rings.

It is time for Mass.

In the Fleeting Moments

Crossing the road, 

I wrote about You.

"Jesus is the answer".

Who else would I think of? 

Who else could I write of,

In the fleeting moments of this busy life,

But You

A Peace Beyond Both Time and Space

Come, let us transcend both time and space.

I hear: "You come from a different world.

You need not conform.

Be as you are, that will suffice."

I nod. Raising my hand, I slowly point towards

The yellow and white criss-crossed keys,

And I whisper: "That is my flag."

For I am neither American nor European

Nor Australian nor Asian

Nor African:

I am Yours.

Church-whispering Your name again and again,

I find a peace beyond both time and space:

I know You are there in the Eucharist.

I feel Your eyes, Your smile on me.

You owe me no proof. I owe you all.

With Your grace, I transcend the calendar,

The days, the clock, the hours.

Talk to me, talk to me about timelessness.

The swinging pendulum of the grandfather clock sneers - 

But Time the tyrant seems to be a myth -

Why measure the hours and the days,

When all we need is to do Your will.

Remember mortal man, forward in time

Is not always forward in love and life

So come, let us transcend both time and space:

Only this moment, this now, matters, and it is Yours

Only here matters, and it is Yours.

O that we could be freed

From the tyranny of the tedious

Hours, minutes, and seconds

And just be as we are, as children of God,

Exist doing God's will, in every passing moment

expression

the way we express

what we express

in this modern era

of phones, data, and ai

is nothing short of

    fra

        gmen

            ted

oceans

my words which are but 

a trial and error description of reality

will never be like yours,

which flow into oceans of infinite, 

life-giving meaning

my words are imperfect.

yours, God, hide unending 

oceans of meaning

In the thirtieth year of my life

In the thirtieth year of my life,

After the skies were split,

And the heavens had spoken,

I followed my will out into the desert,

Where I fasted and prayed for forty days.

Alone in the wilderness with my prayers and my thoughts,

I who have existed before existence,

Thought of you my friend,

Long before you existed.

In your kindness think of me now,

Who wait for you, "a prisoner of my own love",

In the tabernacles of a million churches

Fire in the wilderness

Fire in the wilderness, and all those

Beatuous desert flowers you had looked after so carefully

Gone, incinerated, in the blazing flames.

Those verses you had strung

Equally carefully as poems,

Incinerated in the test of time

And unappreciated in the cacophony of attentions

In this modern world.

What next? What next?

Whatever are we going to do next, darling?

What does a poet do when his

Poems go unread?

Does he give up speaking to an unlistening world

Or does he carry on as a prophet,

Putting out sombre words of life and death,

Just as they are, 

Without beautifying, rhyme, or meter

For anyone who would care to listen?

Am I to blame for writing of life and death

And not of romance and roses?

For I write of Thee, God, and hopefully for Thee,

And what we Thy children truly long for

Is a life after death with Thee

Afterword:

Fire, fire, fire, in the wilderness of my heart

And after the flames of pain and suffering

Have done their work,

All that I want now

    is

        God

   

where do you call home

and they asked me,

conversationally,

where I called home

and I realised in a sudden shock,

that I did not belong here,

nor there, nor anywhere

and I whispered in reply,

as if in a dream:

"God."

the sidewalk

like the fallen, crushed autumn leaves

in the middle of the sidewalk,

trodden into dust by men of dust and clay,

before it is swept into the void -

us

before the autumn,

before we depart,

have mercy on us,

Christ Jesus,

for only in Thee we find transcendence

from this mortal frame.

have mercy

lest we allow ourselves

to be swept away from endless life

transcendence

after the night of raging winds,

in the morning I head out to the street

and see a million paper cards 

scattered everywhere by the wind 

with the word transcendence written 

on each one of them.

the howling wind still races along the street

and its alleys, challenging my mortality,

my transcience, my ephemerality.

oh that I could live forever upon this earth

but I cannot, and the screaming taunt 

of approaching death haunts me.

I take a breath above the waves,

immerse myself in God,

and I am under the waters again -

ICTHUS meaning fish, swims within 

the deep waters, immersed in God -

and so I try to imitate Christ.

I immerse myself in God again,

and continue to write

cities named after me,

books written about me,

and legends spoken

in hushed whispers

about me

all this do I imagine,

in my desire to be remembered

and in my fear of being forgotten.

supposedly pulchritudinous breadcrumbs

in lettered form in these desultory

rambling poems, all leading to one

single yearning of the heart, 

to tell posterity that I was once here.

what egoism what hubris what pride

to have thought that I could

etch my name forever on the shores of time.

by nightfall the waves of death break through

and wash my name away as if I never were here at all

we all fail the test of time even the ever famous ones,

and we will live on only by virtue of charity

if we have had any in this short day on earth.

death is imminent. every step I take 

is one step closer, to that door that leads to God's embrace.

3 billion seconds they say is all we have on average.

every second gone is one second closer to eternity.

one second, one step closer to You.

I, mortal man, terrified of oblivion

I, mortal man, trying to transcend 

transcience and time

I, mortal man. with immortal soul.

like a diamond amidst the dust

for in the evening of life like the falling autumn leaves,

I too fall, I join the soil, and 

this frail dust that I am to dust returns.

and my soul would live on 

in the fullness of life only in God's embrace

I search everywhere, without realizing,

for meaning, for power, 

for glory, for fame,

to somehow be remembered forever,

to somehow be the greatest of them all,

but my search is always in vain.

it merely deepens the emptiness.

    I can find

        transcendence 

            only in God

Church Going

we go to church to have a good time,

to feel good about ourselves,

to feel happy and entertained.

we go to ward off the guilt.

we go in shorts and comfortable t-shirts,

and cheap slippers,

because we are going as if to a picnic,

to the park, to the beach.

it is the only Sunday we have and we want

to make most of it. we could have gone

to the movies, or to the mall, or to the food court instead,

and yet we've come here,

so remember that. we're using up precious time for this,

and we expect it to be worth it. 

so while you're up there, Father, make sure

to say a few jokes and keep us entertained.

we don't want to be bored. and also

tell us that God loves us in spite of what we've done.

now don't start preaching about sin,

we don't want to be feeling bad about ourselves 

when we leave this place.

and it's fine if we're a bit late to Mass, okay,

we are busy people,

don't start telling us off for that.

we will be early for interviews, movie shows, and for lunches with friends,

because those things matter,

but we might be a bit tardy for church.

because it's all about us

    it's all about us

        it's all about us

            and not about God

indeed, it's not like we really need to be here -

it's the 21st century and we are at last truly enlightened.

we have our phones. we have technology. we have ai.

we are adults and do not take baby steps anymore.

we tell ourselves, we can walk without God

    until

        we

            can't 

Beyond the myriad of grumbling voices,

In the tabernacle of the Church,

In the Most Blessed Sacrament

Of the Holy Eucharist,

Wherein is contained the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ,

Wherein is contained all the riches of the Church,

Wherein is contained the hidden elusive treaure 

That all the universe desperately yearns for,

Before Whom kings, warriors, and noblemen genuflect - 

In this Most Blessed Sacrament,

The Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe -

Revered by the angels of the celestial courts

But not honoured by busier men -

Weeps and weeps and weeps,

As men distract themselves from 

The purest gold and diamonds,

Playing in the mud.

His blessèd Heart, hurt and wounded

By a million arrows from mankind on every side,

Bleeds and bleeds and bleeds for mankind.

Like a prisoner in his own palace,

Like a beggar in his own kingdom,

This King humbly, quietly, asks for your love.

What do you say?

The Contagion of a Smile

and I asked them stonecutters,

"mates, when ye engrave ma name

in yon tombstone,

could ya put an exclamation mark after my name

and maybe a picture of me

as a young lad

with a wide, wide smile?"

in life and in death,

I want to smile widely

and see the smile

spread like a plague

from me to my neighbours, 

to everyone in my town,

to everyone who lives.

joy for everyone, none excepting

wind on the trees beside the road

I heard Your voice whispering,

gently, gently,

through the wind blowing

amongst the trees

as the leaves rustled sweetly

You said I love you,

and with the wind and the trees

and all the rustling leaves,

I whispered back

I love You too

of dust and clay and blood and bone

and silently I said unto Him:

my Jesus who loves me

like mad, like mad,

I beg Thee have pity on me

a sinner - a sinner!

dust and clay, mere dust and clay!

this frail, fragile, soon fading being

of blood and bone

cannot live, cannot survive,

without Thy blessed breath!

If Thou takest away Thy breath,

I soon fade away

and depart from this world.

only Thy hand sustains me,

maintains me in this blessed existence

without Thy hand holding me up,

I stumble and fall despite my desperate

tottering, doddering, confused baby steps,

and all I would know is despair, ignominy, and wretchedness

petering out miserably into oblivion,

for I would know not where to walk 

and why and how.

lead Thou me forward, past life, past death,

into Thy hands

hold me up, Lord,

with Thy hands,

if only so that I could feel 

Thy hand in mine,

For the remainder of this long, 

sometimes tedious, journey towards Thee,

hold me up

thus my imperfect, mortal prayer

of dust and clay and blood and bone.

and as an epilogue,

I whisper fiercely to the trees, to the stars, 

to the wind, to anyone who would listen:

I believe that Christ will take care of me

Portrait of a Quixotic Poet

Poor delusional me,

To whom all reality seems textual in nature.

The world is a word, the sun is a noun, the moon is derived from the Old English mōna.

Poor delusional me, a poet in my perception

But an absent-minded Quixote in others.

Caritas

Money profits nothing.

Material possessions deceive in their promise to finally fulfill.

After becoming profiteers of this world's gold and silver,

What would you do? What would you ever do?

After the last piece of gold is spent, and all money has been squandered,

The world having deceived us and robbed us of peace,

Only God and men will remain. Charity will remain forever

Tell me the way you write poetry

Tell me the way you write poetry, and I will enter into your sentences, your words, your very letters,

And I will endeavour to tell you what lurks deep within the heart of your thoughts.

Invite me into your worldview, my friend, though I may not assent to your every opinion, for I have my own,

Show me your world and I will show you mine. I am no psychologist or philosopher to assess you or pass judgement upon you, my friend,

I am but a fellow wayfarer on the journey, a transient passerby, a flitting, fluttering, butterfly, here upon this earth for but a fleeting moment,

In short, consider me your friend for I ardently see you as mine, my brother Man and sister Woman from this family of humankind, living within the homely confines of our pleasant family home called earth,

Let me hear you speak, let me read what you write, let me listen to the rhythym of your thoughts, which I imagine cannot be anything but beautiful, flowing as they do from a soul created in imago Dei,

Let me listen to you for a thousand years, for I know myself and have heard my own thoughts echoing painfully, endlessly, within the Cathedral of my heart, and I know what I think and say and do and think,

Long, long enough have I been the center of my universe, let me learn who you are, my friend, my brother, my sister, my companion, cum panis, you with whom I break my daily bread, my daily bread of the air, the water, and the love of God, upon God's good earth.

Show me your world, and I will show you mine. Invite me to your worldview, and I will say unto you, Tauchen Sie ein in meine Weltanschauung, and welcome you into my mind, my world, my worldview,

Where I desire that you hear of the love of God, of God, of the good, good God...