Sunday

The Oceanic Feeling (2021)


Cover image: Katharina Jaeger / Cover & Book design: William Bardebes



(March 7) The Oceanic Feeling. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7. Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021. 72 pp.
  1. The Oceanic Feeling (7/1-18/10/17)
    2. Family Plot
  2. Lone pine (14/1-5/12/14)
  3. Family plot (26/6-12/8/15)
  4. When you’re the only one (30/9-19/11/17)
  5. Oh br/other! (6/1/16-13/7/17)
  6. This morning Sylvie (16/1/16-7/5/17)
  7. Zero is lying down today (18/1/16-22/10/17)
  8. What to do till the sentinels come (11-23/4/18)
  9. Rituals (9/1/16-7/5/17)
  10. My Uncle Tommy (15-23/4/18)
  11. 1942 (17/9-4/12/16)
  12. Very superstitious (4/1-21/8/16)
  13. Playing the long game (29/1/16-7/5/17)
  14. Are Kiwi women (30/1-29/10/16)
  15. Rather a shock (15/1/16-7/5/17)
  16. Family skeletons (10/1/16-7/5/17)
  17. Self-analysis (11/1/16-7/5/17)
  18. Checking into Facebook (31/1-5/12/16)
  19. A borrowed life (30/9-2/10/17)
  20. Psych 101 (7/1/16-4/1/17)
  21. What do you want? (8/9-13/10/18)
    22. Ice Road Trucker
  22. Ice Road Trucker (7/2-30/3/15)
  23. Two Fords (17/7-12/8/15)
  24. Stranded Polar Bear (21/11-14/12/19)
  25. Indexing Poetry NZ (5/1-29/8/16)
  26. Turning at the doorstep (21/1/16-19/10/17)
  27. The perils of public art (8/1/16-7/5/17)
  28. Communications committee (14/1-4/12/16)
  29. Oral exam, 1990 (1/1-21/8/16)
  30. Everything ages too fast (27/1/16-7/5/17)
  31. Restructuring (7/1-12/3/20)
  32. Kissing the Blarney Stone (23/4-29/8/16)
  33. Skins, 1981 (22/2-14/4/19)
  34. Snorkelling the Great Barrier Reef (17-19/11/17)
  35. Mark (21/6-12/8/15)
  36. Reindeer games (27/12/17)
  37. The Mysterious Island (18-26/4/15)
  38. Antigone (29/5/14; 18/4-13/6/15)
  39. Shorts:
    1. Birds of Passage (12/11/14-7/2/15)
    2. Auckland Anthem (30/3-15/4/12)
    3. Hunting in Palmerston (after Su Shi) (6/9-17/10/13)
    40. Translations
  40. On Early Trains (after Boris Pasternak) (26/1-7/2/15)
  41. Bangalore 2002 (after Boris Pasternak) (30/12/14-7/2/15)
  42. 1913 (after Apollinaire) (21/6-12/8/15)



For my mother and father



•

Jack Ross: The Oceanic Feeling (2021)


Blurb:
Jack Ross’s latest collection combines poems about ‘families – and how to survive them’ (in John Cleese’s phrase) with darkly humorous reflections on Academia and various other aspects of modern life. It concludes with some translations from Boris Pasternak and Guillaume Apollinaire.

The book also includes a suite of drawings by Swiss-New Zealand Artist Katharina Jaeger, ably explicated in an Afterword by Art Writer Bronwyn Lloyd.
'… picture yourself on a Gold Coast beach, the wind idly leafing through the pages of a much-annotated copy of Benjamin’s Arcades Project on your lap; as ‘Baudelaire’ flashes by in your peripheral vision, you disinterestedly observe a sleek conferential shark feeding – though far from frenziedly – on a smorgasbord of swimmers, whose names end with unstressed vowels and whose togs are at least a size too small. The water is the colour of an $8 bottle of rosé. I find reading Ross – to borrow his victims’ parlance – kind of like that.'
- Robert McLean, Landfall Review Online






Out there it’s speed and money
in here it’s moana time
the lava-lava
tethered round your hips
the morning climb
up to the laptop
into cyberspace

sometimes a furry cat
curled up
in her new armchair
sometimes skateboarders
outside on a street
void as Open Homes
can make it


(7/1-18/10/17)

Publications:
  • 8 Poems by New Zealand Poets 2019. Designed by Tara McLeod. Auckland: The Pear Tree Press, 2019. [14-15].
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 9.

Notes:
  • 'In a 1927 letter to Sigmund Freud, French writer Romain Rolland coined the term "the oceanic feeling" as a way of referring to that "sensation of ‘eternity’," of "being one with the external world as a whole," which underlies all religious belief (but does not necessarily depend on it). In his reply, Freud described this as a simple characterisation of the feeling an infant has before it learns there are any other people in the world.' - Works & Days: The Oceanic Feeling.




These works of fiction, which seem so full of hostility, are none of them really so badly intended … they still preserve, under a slight disguise, the child’s original affection for his parents. The faithlessness and ingratitude are only apparent.
– Sigmund Freud, ‘Family Romances’ (1909)


Notes:
  • The original quote reads as follows:
    At about the period I have mentioned, then, the child’s imagination becomes engaged in the task of getting free from the parents of whom he now has such a low opinion and of replacing them by others, occupying, as a rule, a higher social station ...

    If anyone is inclined to turn away in horror from this depravity of the childish heart or feels tempted, indeed, to dispute the possibility of such things, he should observe that these works of fiction, which seem so full of hostility, are none of them really so badly intended, and that they still preserve, under a slight disguise, the child’s original affection for his parents. The faithlessness and ingratitude are only apparent ...

    Indeed the whole effort at replacing the real father by a superior one is only an expression of the child’s longing for the happy, vanished days when his father seemed to him the noblest and strongest of men and mother the dearest and loveliest of women. He is turning away from the father whom he knows to-day to the father in whom he believed in the earlier years of his childhood; and his phantasy is no more than the expression of a regret that those happy days have gone. ...
    - Sigmund Freud, Collected Papers 5, ed. James Strachey (New York: Basic Books, 1959), 74-78.



•




Bronwyn woke me at 6 am
the tree-fellers are coming today

the supermarket foreman James
remembers my father skiting about

his son in the Edinburgh pipe band
we hear James across the fence sometimes

cursing the idle forecourt hands
Bronwyn went across to warn him

the tree-fellers’ truck was far too wide
blocking deliveries in and out

Bronwyn came in to update me
they’re moving in nearer to the fence

a van roared by to prove it could
The chainsaws started up above

my last view as I left for work
was of the tallest of our trees

stripped of its branches    standing bare
just like my father at the end


(14/1-5/12/14)

Publications:



•




I

I noticed him late last year
as I climbed the back
stairs at work

a beetle
spindly legs upflung
on the first flight down

among the dustbunnies
and detritus
of a busy office

in a while he was joined
by a tiny dead
centipede

now every morning
I say hello
and pass the time of day

illimitable spans of air
above him
his ship of eternity

lofty as the sky

 
II

PETER
d. 1976

SASHA
d. 18.3.86

MISHA
d. 23-2-90

PETYA
LOVED AND
HANDSOME

NIKITA
MUCH LOVED
d. 30.9.93

MITYA
BOLD & BEAUTIFUL
d. 5.4.94

POUPOUSSE
OUR LOVELY FRIEND
d. 31.10.05

written on our back fence

 
III

At North Shore Memorial Park
on Schnapper Rock Rd

in Central Div
Bronze 6

Block B
Row H

Plot 17
beside Grandma’s grave

my sister’s ashes
have been joined

by my father’s wooden
urn

we haven’t yet 
ordered made

the little plaque
wishing him

quiet sleep
and a sweet dream

when the long trick’s over


(26/6-12/8/15)

Publications:
  • Broadcast on Can Poetry Save the Earth? A Public lecture with Prof. Bryan Walpert, Dr. Johanna Emeney & Jack Ross. Massey University podcast (31/5/18): [available at: Our Changing World].
  • "Can Poetry Save the Earth?" Papyri (31/5/18)
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 14.



•




who still remembers
your father’s anecdotes

my mother’s failing memory
having taken out

the precious boon
of parallel verification

those last few witnesses
are all you have

my father and my uncle 
drilling like tin soldiers

at Takapuna Grammar
(says Kevin Ireland)

my father standing 
in a garden yelling 

damn them all
(my brother Ken)

the schizophrenic boy 
I gave a lift to Milford once 

who knew him as the family GP
and found such comfort

in my father’s words 
it makes you want to run out screaming 

with an axe


(30/9-19/11/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 17.



•




My eldest brother is flying up

to Auckland
for the weekend
to see my mother

Bronwyn is flying down
to see her sister
in Wellington on Friday

coincidence? hardly
Bronwyn’s younger brother
arrives today

last time we stayed with him
I had a tantrum
and wouldn’t sleep another night

under his roof
I read a thesis recently
on placing far less stress

on Oedipus
the br/other was the term
the author coined

for his new theory
Luke, I am your father!
try your brother

then the sparks will fly


(6/1/16-13/7/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 18.



•




brought in a rat
or rather    last night
Bronwyn had her breakfast

on the couch
under which said rat
was hiding

not knowing why
Sylvie kept jumping up
on her

it wasn’t till her sister
came out and saw it
that the truth

became clear
first they ran out
hoping Sylvie would finish

the work she had begun
she didn’t
the primeval horror of the rat

led Bronwyn to open
all the doors
so Signor could make his exit

her sister went around behind
closing them
so Sylvie could earn her keep

finally they decided to drive
from Paekakariki
to Martinborough

where their brother lives
with Celia
Celia

who is fearless
said she would deal with it
if it was still there

driving my mother
in for an MRI
suddenly sounds

a bit like a rest cure


(16/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 19.



•




but little specks of blood
on the bedspread
make me think

she may have run into
one of her twin nemeses
last night

Yellow
a big green-collared
glutton

or Brindle
a raccoon-tailed
bully

each of whom
sneaks in the back door
several times a day

to eat her food
she jumps out
hisses at them

but is only a little cat
once or twice we’ve seen
them ganging up on her

unable to help her
unless it’s in plain sight
I suppose that’s it

Zero
is now the thing
we most fear losing

yet cannot safeguard
threaten to crush
with the sheer weight 

of our love


(18/1/16-22/10/17)

Publications:
  • Poetry New Zealand Yearbook 2020 [Issue #54]. Ed. Johanna Emeney. ISBN 978-0-9951229-3-2. Auckland: Massey University Press, 2020: 117-18.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 21.
  • "Poetry Shelf celebrates new books: Jack Ross reads from The Oceanic Feeling.” [available at: NZ Poetry Shelf: a poetry page with reviews, interviews and other things, ed. Paula Green (20/5/21)].
  • "Zero at the Bone." The Imaginary Museum (23/4/23)
  • "The Zero Suite." Papyri (2/5/23)



•




Yes, astronaut and cosmonaut – report, indeed! 
Warn, if you can, your half-waking, half-sleeping 
planet! Tell them, if you can … 
– Roy Thomas, Avengers #102


So how was Zero?
oh she was fine
did you have any trouble getting in?
no no

when we got home
Zero’s dish was empty
meat left unopened 
in the fridge 

the thunderstorm 
had driven her outside
to cringe
under the garden shed

she had quite a lot to say 
when Bronwyn ran out
crying and calling out
her name

it’s not that my mother
neglected her task
on purpose
she’d written in her diary

FEED THE CAT!
it’s just that her mind
now fills in blanks
with certainties 

not doubts
there was a slight pause 
before that “fine”
all I know is our cat

left alone
in the storm
my mother alone
in the fog of her brain


(11-23/4/18)

Publications:
  • Broadcast on Can Poetry Save the Earth? A Public lecture with Prof. Bryan Walpert, Dr. Johanna Emeney & Jack Ross. Massey University podcast (31/5/18): [available at: Our Changing World].
  • "Can Poetry Save the Earth?" Papyri (31/5/18)
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 22.
  • "The Zero Suite." Papyri (2/5/23)

Notes:



•




every Saturday at 12
my mother comes across the road
for lunch

we never go the other way
Tuesdays    fortnightly
she has her Bible group

sometimes she visits Pak-’n’-Save
with Leslie    her tenant
from further up the street

she used to love the movies
now can’t follow
plots with flashbacks

which is all of them
she used to like to go for drives
but now gets tired

still tidies the flat
but honestly
there’s not much to be said

except things can always get worse
she’s not in pain (particularly)
except from arthritis

can move about quite easily
we try to keep it light and cheerful
don’t anticipate trouble

said the specialist
trail along behind
we’re trailing    yes

something like that


(9/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 23.



•




“In the end they had to put him
in a home

Tommy had grown too heavy
for Dad to carry

Dad worried about it
till he went to visit

tried to hug him
Tommy didn’t know him

was not aware
of where they were

it was my mother
I was sorry for

she thought she was to blame
for having him

my brother shared a room
with him

all night he’d rock
inside his cot

one winter he got sick 
and never spoke

again
no-one

could visit us
because 

of Tommy”


(15-23/4/18)

Publications:
  • Paula Green: NZ Poetry Shelf [available at: https://nzpoetryshelf.com/2018/05/07/monday-poem-jack-rosss-my-uncle-tommy/] (7/5/18).
  • Broadcast on Can Poetry Save the Earth? A Public lecture with Prof. Bryan Walpert, Dr. Johanna Emeney & Jack Ross. Massey University podcast (31/5/18): [available at: Our Changing World].
  • "Can Poetry Save the Earth?" Papyri (31/5/18)
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 24.



•




The picture is sepia-toned
like the not-too-far-distant war

the need to stay silent at mealtimes
so her father can hear

every radio news report
the need to pose paramount

in the stiff lines of this schoolgirl
reaching out a tentative hand

to the strangest of beasts
in the latter stages of dementia

my father removed her photos
replacing them with snaps

of his militaria
I don’t think she understands

what we see in this picture
the meekness before authority

the gentleness of the pose
the dark fringe of trees

in a faraway world
where my mother

has just been told
to pretend to feed

a wallaby


(17/9-4/12/16)

Publications:
  • 1942. Poem by Jack Ross. Design by Bronwyn Lloyd. Pania Singles 4. Auckland: Pania Press, 2016.
  • Jack's Christmas Special 2016. Mosehouse Studio (25/12/16).
  • Dianne Firth, Poetry and Place: Catalogue for the Poetry and Place Exhibition, Belconnen Art Centre, 25 August – 17 September 2017 (Canberra: University of Canberra, 2017): 10.
  • Poetry Specials: 2008-2018. Papyri (28/12/2017)
  • Broadcast on Can Poetry Save the Earth? A Public lecture with Prof. Bryan Walpert, Dr. Johanna Emeney & Jack Ross. Massey University podcast (31/5/18): [available at: Our Changing World].
  • "Can Poetry Save the Earth?" Papyri (31/5/18)
  • Paula Green, "Poetry Shelf poets on their own poems: Jack Ross reads and comments on ‘1942’.” [available at: NZ Poetry Shelf: a poetry page with reviews, interviews and other things (5/8/20)].
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 25.

Notes:



•




Never say anything optimistic
is (of course) the first of them
as (for instance)
it could be worse, it could be raining

touching wood (tap forehead)
count up the integers of any
especially significant number
(date – account number – pin)

to make sure they add up to 7
9 or 3 (4 at a pinch
but not 13)
stormy weather outside

= peace within
it’s generally a good omen
to catch someone on the first ring
(if you have to call back

it’ll take more than two or three tries
and the answer’s bound to be
unsatisfactory)
don’t care too much

for anything you own
lest the destructive impulse
overhear
and swat you casually 

never start off the day
with what you really want to be doing
look bored
conceal activity

with indolence


(4/1-21/8/16)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 26.



•




I’ve been wanting to do this
since we first met
ten years ago

as we spend the morning
stripping bookcases
in my old office

most striking discoveries
so far
a mummified weta

and a series of pods
where cockroaches
have been breeding

why would anybody ever want
so many books?
it’s quite insane

author after author
all their books
in chronological order

W. H. Auden
Lord (& Robert)
Byron

Angela Carter
travel    fantasy    sci fi
occult

it’ll make a nice guest space
I don’t know that I’ll miss
it much

the cat
is worried though
where will she go?


(29/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 27.



•




too controlling?
a question I’ve been asked
a couple of times

I guess it depends
on what you’re
looking for

men are quite useless
really
looking at piles of laundry

and ignoring them
but turning a
blind eye

when you’re on top of
things means
less and less

you need to be on top of
we put up 
masking tape

around the light switches
to prevent
the paint

from spreading everywhere
even so
it has a way

of going where it needs to go


(30/1-29/10/16)

Publications:
  • Poetry New Zealand Yearbook 2020 [Issue #54]. Ed. Johanna Emeney. ISBN 978-0-9951229-3-2. Auckland: Massey University Press, 2020: 169.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 28.



•




i.m. Alan Rickman (1947-2016)


to think it’s been 25 years since
Truly Madly Deeply
1991

my sister died
or rather
killed herself

so hungry ghosts
seemed documentary realism
to me

living by Lake Pupuke 
with its gigantic eels
and those students next door

who had to pump up the stereo
to psych themselves
into going out

every evening
1991
an unhappy time

as Rickman said
roles win Oscars
actors don’t

that swing inscribed for 
Alice who used to play here
that makes the other parents

hold onto their kids
so tight
as though death were an infection

they might pick up


(15/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • Limited edition poster by Bronwyn Lloyd (Auckland: Pania Press, 2017).
  • Jack’s Birthday Book. Mosehouse Studio (5/11/17).
  • Poetry Specials: 2008-2018. Papyri (28/12/2017)
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 29.



•




My father walked down
to his surgery
beside the house
every evening at 7 pm

which is when my sister
would come down from her room
to tell my mother
how much she wanted to die

when he came back around eight
they’d shift into the dining room
until he went to bed
then go on till the wee hours

one day my sister went out to the back yard
to hang herself
but just as she was throwing
a rope across a branch

she saw some people
watching her
from the parking lot next door
and decided not to

they might have intervened
I’ve often wondered why 
She didn’t go back at night
when nobody could see?

maybe she was scared of the dark
maybe she wasn’t so all-fired keen
on hanging herself    after all
in the end it was pills 

she took


(10/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 30.



•




After Freud’s father died
over the next four years
he sank into himself

insight like this
comes once in a lifetime
The result was

The Interpretation of Dreams
It’s been four years now
since my father died

and I’m still trying hard
to understand him
ticking through

his character traits
bonhomie    garrulity
collecting / hoarding

wondering if they came
from his own father’s suicide
when he was 12

his mother’s refusal
to hang    onto anything
it’s not that I’m critical of him

anything but
simply concerned
not to act out

the same marionette dance


(11/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 31.



•




this morning
I find the question
what is a spirit?

and one reply
what you expel
when sneezing

quite apposite 
to what I was reading
last night

Rushdie’s
tired fantasy
Rushdi children of Abu-Rus

or the character Lili
dreamed up by Einar
in The Danish Girl

but pre-existent
s/he claims
Matthew McConaughey

in True Detective
takes an opposing view
the body is a machine

without a ghost
simply the illusion of 
individuality

he claims to detect
in the eyes
of each murder victim

a sense of relief
what we call 
‘Shakespeare’

isn’t Shakespeare
the theatrical entrepreneur
retiring in mild prosperity

to his home town
But is anything
(let alone anyone)

more real?
by any criteria
one has to admit

something more there
than a phrase-cranking
machine

whether there can be survival
the facts of the illusion
are so strong 

they outweigh self-negation
confirm the heavy
burden

we lay down


(31/1-5/12/16)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 32.



•




I almost hit a man
this morning 
with my car

an elderly man
about to walk down
the low level

the original line 
of the road
now only used

by those of us 
with driveways on it
he looked distracted

mildly shocked
most people drive too fast 
myself included

resentful
at having to share
with our dog-walking

coffee-toting
neighbours
alert to dodge 

the crooked edges
of the Art Centre
mosaics

in the asphalt
I missed
of course

but drove most gingerly 
all day
as if my life 

were now on loan
from inquests funerals court
cases loss of licence prison even

killer
not murderer
presumably

who knows?


(30/9-2/10/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 34.



•




These acts of self-discovery
   that mean so little
working out the person

you thought disliked you
   is in fact
disliked by you

how does that help?
   it makes it more your fault
you don’t get on

might make it
   easier to pretend
you do

looking out on a bleak morning
   grey in the east 
the cat outside

a headless dead rat
   for trophy
sometimes one fails to see

the glory


(7/1/16-4/1/17)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 36.



•




said the librarian
   in Friendly Feilding
to come in from the cold
   was my reply

we’re closing an hour early
   for a function
the function I’d driven down for
   I walked away

he’s crying
   but he doesn’t know 
why he’s crying
   said my sister

to the primer one teacher 
   who wanted to know why
I guess I do too 
   I guess I do

I was small and afraid 
   of a brand-new place 
so many people
   but what remains 

is kindness
   my sister 
trying to help
   unavailingly


(8/9-13/10/18)

Publications:



•

Ice Road Trucker


You learn the road really fast… or you end up dead.
– Jack Jessee (2009)


Notes:



•




The engine cut out
halfway down the off-ramp

just as the lights turned green
ease up onto the shoulder

now put on
your hazard lights

said Bronwyn
we went for help

she left me at the service station
when I got back to the car

a cop was there
a bus had clipped a ute

just down the street
I needed that like a hole in the head

he said
the towie was a wiry older guy

who hoisted up the car
quite effortlessly

as we bounced around
the cockpit of his truck

I thought
now I know how it feels

to drive a big rig
across the ice-fields

my alter ego
CB in hand

can of Jim Beam
between the legs

horizon pewter-grey


(7/2-30/3/15)

Publications:
  • Limited edition poster by Daniel Fyles (Ashhurst: Fyles Web Design, 2015).
  • Ice Road Trucker. nzepc: Six Pack Sound #02. Compiled and edited by Michele Leggott, Tim Page and Brian Flaherty (2/12/15).
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 42.
  • Poetry Specials: 2008-2018. Papyri (28/12/2017)
  • Deborah Walker. “World Poetry Day: Massey University – Johanna Emeney, Bryan Walpert & Jack Ross read.” [available at: YouTubeNZ (21/3/21)].

Notes:
  • The reference is to US / Canadian TV Reality show Ice Road Truckers (2007-2017) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_Road_Truckers].
  • Charles Olsen, " Palabras prestadas #117." Available at: http://libropalabrasprestadas.blogspot.com/2017/05/palabras-prestadas-117.html (5/5/2017).
    Camionero sobre hielo

    El motor se detuvo
    a medio bajada por la rampa de salida

    justo cuando cambió el semáforo a verde
    para con cuidado en el arcén

    y enciende
    la luces de emergencia

    decía Bronwyn
    fuimos a buscar ayuda

    me dejó en la estación de servicio
    cuando llegué al coche

    había un policía
    un autobús había golpeado un vehículo utilitario

    calle abajo
    Necesitaba esto como un tiro en la cabeza

    decía
    el de la grúa era un viejo fibroso

    que levantó el coche
    sin esfuerzo

    mientras dábamos saltos
    en la cabina de su camión

    pensé
    ya sé qué se siente

    al conducir un gran camión
    sobre los campos de hielo

    mi álter ego
    radio frequencia en mano

    abierta la botella de Jim Beam
    entre las piernas

    el horizonte gris de peltre


    - (Traducción del poema "Ice Road Trucker" de Jack Ross – traducido por Charles Olsen)

    •


    Jack Ross ha publicado varios libros de poesía, entre ellos City of Strange Brunettes (1998), Chantal's Book (2002), To Terezín (2007), Celanie (2012) y A Clearer View of the Hinterland (2014), además de cuatro novelas y dos libros de relatos cortos. Es director y editor de la revista Poetry NZ, y ha editado diversas revistas literarias y antologías. Tiene un doctorado en Inglés y Literatura Comparativa de la Universidad de Edimburgo y actualmente es Catedrático en Escritura Creativa en Massey University.

    mairangibay.blogspot.co.nz
    New Zealand Book Council – Jack Ross



•




When my car-before-last was totalled
I was forced to leave her

my little blue Laser
by the motorway exit

couldn’t get time off
to clean out the cockpit

arrived at the depot
to find all my stuff on the floor

but then came red Piers
PR 9216

till yesterday
when after ten years of service

he was towed away
and even then

cold in the garage
he managed to cough up a spark

after ten minutes of trying
and drive me around the block

just one more time


(17/7-12/8/15)

Publications:
  • Ron Riddell, ed. Forty Years of the Titirangi Poets (Auckland: Printable Reality, 2017): 106.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 43.



•




The ripples imply 
a boat’s passed by

or something larger
like a whale

the islet’s small
and artificial

looking
like the bear

enduring exile
Augustus sent 

his family
to islands 

small enough 
to terrify 

even the young
willing to die

until you realise
it’s a fake 

that bear 
was never there

even his shadow
clouds and drift ice

carefully placed 
to make the point 

that lying is okay
when the legend becomes fact

print the legend
said John Ford 

by saying it 
he showed

he didn’t mean it


(21/11-14/12/19)

Publications:

Notes:



•




Relinquunt Omnia Servare Rem Publicam
[They gave up all to serve the public thing]


It does make you wonder sometimes
what’s the point?
so many names
so many earnest strivers

some who’ve ‘gone on before’
some not
but here they all are
buried in the back issues

of a mad old periodical
speaking truth to power
the titles alone
make you want to look them up

What shall we tell Li Bo?
Oracle Bones
I suppose the truth
of the matter

is in the performance
those eager scrawls
sent off with such trepidation
to whoever happened to be 

in the hot seat that day
and then acceptance
or – that other thing
leafing through to your poem

oh I didn’t notice
you were in the same issue
one can’t help feeling
this isn’t quite it

not that I’m any fan
of ranting on street corners
or bellowing clichés
through megaphones

we are just a couple of islands
in the middle
of the world’s largest ocean
and yet potentially

one likes to imagine a
‘For the Union Dead’
the drained faces of negro schoolchildren
rise like balloons

the ditch is nearer


(5/1-29/8/16)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 46.

Notes:



•




to add more explanations
to the name-dropping profusion
of the long evening

my best friend
a very good friend
we used to hang out all the time

what is this compulsion
to talk continuously?
not to let a tick pass

without your mouth moving?
can you really imagine
anyone cares?

two hours without drawing a breath
I know I’m doing all the talking
well    if you know

then shut up
ask a question
for once in your life

listen to the silence
hear what it’s got to tell you
things about age

and death


(21/1/16-19/10/17)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 48.



•




The piece was sold 
   with every possible precaution
what height to hang it at

what temperature
   not in direct sunlight
solemnly agreed

the next ones in
   saw a bolt of old tapa
stuck to their new wall

they tore it down
   and folded it
and then gave it away

you don’t fold tapa cloth
   perhaps with months or years
of careful restoration

something can be done
   but those plaintive emails
which go around

from time to time
   has anyone seen the Don Peebles?
what about the McCahon?

that old grate belching steam
   the giant chicken wing
do have this virtue

they are quite difficult to steal


(8/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 49.



•




One of the major
   bones of contention
      was what colour

the graduation hood
   should be
      we had a whole range

cerise
   nut-brown
      electric blue

but most had
   alas been preempted
      by other degrees and schools

at length
   after eighteen months
      we got a quote

of ten thousand dollars 
   enough for the bolts of cloth
      to be bought and woven

especially
   (not counting
      the fur trim)

and at that point
   I moved we stick
      to the existing colours

and never discuss the matter again
   once more
      without the sarcasm	

replied the Chair


(14/1-4/12/16)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 50.



•




Can a mountain be a character?
   I couldn’t answer then
      nor can I now
		
but think about it still
   sometimes
      can a mountain be
		
a character?
   I suppose it depends
      on how you define a ‘mountain’
		
or a ‘character’
   and the fact 
      that all the numbers
		
add up to nine
   is hardly proof
      I deserved to pass

that day
   What’s the equivalent of
      ‘It’s only dangerous
		
when the drums stop?’
   Those are nice boots 
      Señor
		
perhaps


(1/1-21/8/16)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 51.



•




on our campus
the bright red 30 signs
have faded to ochre

the plaster pediments
been kicked to shit
round the base of the Study Centre

and as you breast
the roundabout
you can glimpse the majestic vista

of the rubbish skips
from infancy to senility
without a period of maturity

as some English smart-arse said
of the US of A
Trump Gothic

our ‘Tuscan hilltop village’ design
with the closed off balconies
no-one can jump off

but most of the lights still work
and broken chairs 
are generally collected

after six months or so
and we each have our little bolthole
in the wall


(27/1/16-7/5/17)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 52.



•




It seems to have taken them
less than half an hour
to establish a trade route

from the shut front door
to Zero’s plate of food
with three meat chunks left on it

those small brown ants
there must have been
hundreds of them

was it the rain that day?
the forty rainless days
before that?

we sucked them up
with the vacuum
put poison down

the news of redundancies 
relocation fees
tell us what we thought 

we were doing
these twenty years
building a campus

was little more
than pissing in the wind
we might as well

have just stayed home instead


(7/1-12/3/20)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 53.



•




for Michael Dean


The excuse was
it was early
we were nearly the first 
into the castle that day

the stone was not yet
glistening with spit
so I thought
why not?

one had to lean back
and kiss it upside down
(an improvement on 
the earlier method

where they hung people
over the battlements
by both feet)
but what I remember

is the eloquence
with which you denounced me
as we drove away
I was all the fools in the world

for mashing my lips
in all those germs 
it seemed in fact
to have had the reverse effect

of shutting me up
and jamming you on send
but I’ve never regretted it since
though perhaps you may?


(23/4-29/8/16)

Publications:
  • Manawatu Writers' Festival 2018: Poetry. Ed. Rachel Doré & Chris Gallavin. Feilding: Manawatu Writers' Festival, 2018. [10].
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 54.



•




From the cave to the cave
climbing down underground
to sit among the barrels 

of the bar
somewhere below the void
of Queen’s Arcade

owing a beer
to the older
Post Office employee 

who finally vetoed
further talk
of paying it back

asking the cute older woman
out for ice-cream
getting upset when 

initial agreement turned
into a weary brush-off
forgetting the name

of my last year’s workmate
Christine
for Pauline

Tony!
a sun-burnt streak of biltong 
full of rabidly expressed 

opinions
where is he?
where’s the goat? 

seeing him last 
at my farewell do
what are you doing here?
 
we came to see you
I went there to see them 
I guess

or not so much
to process second mortgages
in the Post Office Savings Bank

workers stroll around 
the debris
dust rises

something has gone wrong


(22/2-14/4/19)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 55.



•




It soon became apparent
that trying to reach the boat

through a cloud of flailing kids
bumping into each other

would be futile
in the extreme

so I turned boldly
having spat in my facemask

as advised
to face the terrors of the deep

which mainly consisted
of lumps of coral 

and multi-coloured fish
drifting around

with inexplicable calm
considering all that racket

the climax came later
back on board

when my newly purchased straw hat
blew into the drink 

and was promptly rescued
by some sun-bronzed he-men

in a zodiac


(17-19/11/17)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 57.



•




a large ungainly teenager
used to treat me to drinks

at the cinema bar
he liked to show off

said he’d almost cried
when he saw the new

state-of-the-art seats
at the Botany Park Hoyts

I went there so often
that all of them knew me

the manager too
one day

he was chatting with us
when he noticed

that Mark hadn’t charged me
don’t ever do that again

he said
as he walked away


(21/6-12/8/15)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 58.



•




Your animal totem	            Tonight our homestay student 
   is the snake	                       was followed by 2 men
      like him you have the power         in a white van 

to captivate with your	            they said some sexual things
   mysterious gaze	                to her
      you are a part	                   she ran away

of the great mysteries of life	   later another Asian
   mystical consumed	               with clear English 
      by passion curious 	             approached her

hardheaded courageous	            from behind 
   enigmatic talented at	          and said crude things 
      cultivating secrecy 	             she crossed the street 

sensual though not carnal 	     this happened around 9pm tonight


(27/12/17)

Publications:
  • Spin 28 (1997): 42.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 59.



•




The sign saying                      had an epiphany
   GRASS C3                            ‘I didn’t know places
      presumably                           like this

distinguishes it                     even existed!’
   from                                 well
      GRASS B3                           they don’t

on the other side                    just before being
   of the runway                         electrocuted
      nice to know                          by a live mike

if we forget                         the murderer might as well
   it’s there                            have been labelled
      mist                                   ‘M’

flocks off                           so is that
   the mountaintops                     the distinction?
      or should I say                      Nominalism

‘clouds’                             and Realism?
   ‘drift off’                           things that fall into
      ‘the hills’?                        their names

in Murder                            and those that veer
   She Wrote                             away from them?
      for instance                          like the rock-well

the scruffy rocker                   in L’île mystérieuse
   ending up in                          Nemo
      Cabot Cove                            and Nautilus

                                     lurking underneath?


(18-26/4/15)

Publications:
  • Percutio 9 (2015): 68.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 60.

Notes:



•




Tomb, bridal-chamber, eternal prison in the caverned rock, whither go to find mine own? 
– R. C. Jebb


When I woke up in
the melancholy city
everything was the colour of rain
all of the garish
primaries
of the previous evening

obscured by
the pitter-patter
of dread
The books I was reading
dissolved into pulp
those volumes of

lapidary thoughts
intangible as fog
as that happiness
oh so elusive
what’s new
you say

Once in Tasmania
at an old colonial prison
I walked into one of the cells
there was no-one around
so I closed the door
just to feel what it was like

I lasted two seconds
people go mad
they say
Imagine a room
a white room
no doors

no chairs
too narrow
to sit down
too low
to stand
up

my marriage bed


(29/5/14; 18/4-13/6/15)

Publications:
  • Percutio 9 (2015): 69.
  • special edition. Mosehouse Studio (21/12/2015)
  • Antigone. Poem by Jack Ross. Design by Bronwyn Lloyd. Pania Singles 3. Auckland: Pania Press, 2015.
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 61.
  • Poetry Specials: 2008-2018. Papyri (28/12/2017)

Notes:
  • The quotation is from R. C. Jebb’s 1888 English prose translation of Sophocles' Antigone.



•

Shorts:






Stuck in a wheelchair
   the i-phone
      makes you equal

Sparrows in the departure lounge
   girl yawns
      into her screen


(12/11/14-7/2/15)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 63.



•




lackadaisical
Asian girl
blocks you

as you hurry to
the traffic lights


(30/3-15/4/12)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 63.



•




after Su Shi


The tiger leaps at movement in
the bed	                 or anywhere else
for that matter 	 Where’s your
effing Tiger? 	         at the

Contact Course		 Vituperation
in a good cause		 no doubt
or just to sound big?
I hope	                 sincerely meant


(6/9-17/10/13)

Publications:
  • The Oceanic Feeling. Poems by Jack Ross. Drawings by Katharina Jaeger. Afterword by Bronwyn Lloyd. ISBN 978-0-473-55801-7 (Auckland: Salt & Greyboy Press, 2021): 63.

Notes:
  • This poem is indebted to the rhymed translation of Su Shi's "Hunting at Mizhou" (with facing Chinese original) provided by Xu Yuan Zhong in his Golden Treasury of Chinese Lyrics (Beijing: Peking University Press, 1990), 193.



•

Translations


What has never been properly recognized is the absolute value of the margin itself. … When shall that true poet arise who, disdaining the trivialities of text, shall give the world a book of verse consisting entirely of margin?
– Kenneth Grahame, “Marginalia” (1892)


Notes:
  • Quoted from Kenneth Grahame. Pagan Papers. 1893 (London: John Lane The Bodley Head Limited, 1898), 81.



•




after Boris Pasternak


Fields fade to mauve in the heat
through the window villagers
stroll what is there to kiss
everything you see melts to soft wax

you dream not asleep dreaming
of being asleep there is someone
sleeping here two black suns
scorching their lashes through their eyelids

sun-beams catch iridescent insects
the glass of dragon-flies the second-
class carriage full of comings
and goings like a clockmaker’s kit 

you seem to be sleeping
in a vice of numbers
high above in amber the hands
of a clock dividing the air

noting fluctuations in heat
get up from your seat adjust
the clock lean out scatter the shadows
pierce the fug of the day

register yourself on its blue dome 
your home your happiness sinking
down past the wreck of your dreams
happy people never help the clock

these two slept in its beams


(26/1-7/2/15)

Publications:

Notes:
  • Based on Dmitri Obolensky's literal version of Boris Pasternak's "In the Wood" (1917), from The Penguin Book of Russian Verse: With Plain Prose translations of Each Poem. Ed. Dmitri Obolensky. 1962. Rev. ed. 1965. The Penguin Poets, D57. Ed. J. M. Cohen (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1967): 332-33.



•




after Boris Pasternak


Wonderful that road to the open
horizon wide as the sea
importunate beggars traffic snarls
mosquitoes floating by

skyscrapers line up with clouds
fade to black like a volcano
the street has grown damp
you sway drift stub your toe

the crowd choppy like waves
James Dean punks jostle us
you sway drift stub your toe
wonderful to walk the streets like this

isn’t that our mall in the distance?
how can you tell? isn’t that the theatre?
getting there yes found it at last
crowds and people and drama all here

and the Milky Way slants towards Chennai
like a cow-wallow and if you look 
behind the mall it will astonish you
lying bare naked in the dark

Meera is fluent in English
loves Wodehouse and Wilde
raised a theosophist
proud and dignified

the youngsters jostle her
and she stops and withers them
with a look all India
in her tiny grandeur then

and up we go treading
on the universe
when did the stars descend
midnight sink through the mirror glass?

let the city arbitrate
and night judge between us
When did the mosquitoes stop whining
cars brushing off the beggars?

close your eyes you’ll go blind
in the beginning we fell
Meera is blazing in the darkness
like a parachute    terrible beautiful


(30/12/14-7/2/15)

Publications:

Notes:
  • Based on Dmitri Obolensky's literal version of Boris Pasternak's "The Steppe" (1917), from The Penguin Book of Russian Verse: With Plain Prose translations of Each Poem. Ed. Dmitri Obolensky. 1962. Rev. ed. 1965. The Penguin Poets, D57. Ed. J. M. Cohen (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1967): 330-32.



•




after Apollinaire


Sea’s edge
		summer’s end
gulls fly
		waves leave behind
glass blobs
		of jellyfish
ships pass
		on the horizon
wind dies in the pines

sun sinks
		behind the islands
foam
		bruises the sand
the sea
		darkens to purple
you fool
		naked 	alone
shout your fear into the storm


(21/6-12/8/15)

Publications:

Notes:
  • Adapted from Guillaume Apollinaire's "Je suis au bord de l’océan sur une plage" (1913), Oeuvres poétiques. Ed. Marcel Adéma & Michel Décaudin. 1956. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 121 (Paris: Éditions Gallimard, 1966): 734.




•



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