For Justin Clemens

Fin-de-Siècle France
much more congenial

to the glum exuberance
of your thoughts. Exile

in the land of mediocrity
and gum-trees, no doubt

unjust as Ovid’s. Our Caesar
a banal bureaucrat who

jogs around a lake
in Canberra. “Intellectuals”

debate base quackery
in our desert island’s

bored media. Nearly
buried by the sandstorm’s

insignificance, I asked
for a good idea. My thesis

a pauper’s grave,
withered formulae; since

the thirst for life
often kills. I was, frankly,

serious. You: “Then again
there are no good ideas”

and discoursed
with obstinate, burning

exactitude the belief
of doubt. Abelard lost

his balls for this. You
may be the last cynic

in the barren domain
of odious and senseless

pastoral optimism;
the strained and resilient

rope flung toward
my hands sinking in

the sand of the island’s
so-called culture, or lack

thereof. Amen.