The new Minister's brief to the Head of Department

No leaping out

from behind hidden agendas,

no lining lame ducks up

for media pot shots,

no scaring the crap out of me

with revelations or defamations

and definitely no defecations

in my corner.

Hire the best spin doctor going -

one that will guild

your OIA gnome droppings

so they look like

unvarnished truth lollies.

Send your top policy wonk

to work in my office -

they can rewrite

your dreary drivel

to better reflect

what I told you to say

in the first place.

Absolutely NO surprises

or I will make sure you slide down

the gnome stud book

faster than Jack abseiled

the beanstalk when the giant

started fee-fi-fo-ing.

That's all for now -

drop by next week

and brief me on the cock-ups

you've had to cover up.

My apologies to anyone who has visited this blog during the last 18 months in the hope of finding a new post. I took a long break that was neither planned nor caused by physical ailment, nor did it result from anything as mundane as writer’s block – in fact, I have put together another collection of writing over that time. More about that in the next post (which I promise will follow soon after this one).

During the ‘between posts’ interregnum, I also had a poem published in an anthology of political poetry, ‘Manifesto Aotearoa: 101political poems’ (Otago University Press, Edited by Philip Temple and Emma Neale, 2017). The poem was ‘The Head of Department’s Prayer on a change of Government’. I wrote it several years ago and only sent it to the anthology to make up my submission’s numbers. The poem is a parody on the Lord’s Prayer and my thinking was that such writing is a bit naff these days, but what did I know. I had also previously posted it on this blog here, but if you like political poetry, I strongly recommend you take a look at Manifesto Aotearoa, available online at Unity Books and other good booksellers.

The reception the Head of Department poem received was very positive, so I have decided to develop a series of poems based on the departmental and political context that the Head of Department works in. The poem above is one of these. I will post more as they take shape. (An 'OIA' is an Official Information Act request, which anybody can submit to a department in order to gain access to specific information.)

Cartoon briefs - there was an old woman who lived in a shoe

• A large octopus with the words "Housing Crisis" written on its body has one arm wrapped around John Key, Bill English, Nick Smith, Stephen Joyce and Paula Bennett. Bill's speech bubble says "Just wait, it has to let go eventually." The others have expressions ranging from terror to astonishment on their faces. The arm wrapped around the cabinet ministers has "political fallout" written on it. The remaining flailing arms each have one of the following sets of words on them: homelessness, first home ownership, street beggars, garage dwellers, slum landlords, unhealthy houses, land bankers.

• The cartoon is divided in two diagonally. In the bottom left, there is a multi-level building with a sign on it - "Housing Crisis Casino". Glitter, fireworks, and stars surround the top of the building. On the ground outside, a small group of people with bows are firing arrows at the top storey. The words "Government Measures to Stop Crisis" are written above four or five arrows in flight. In the top right half of the cartoon, a group of cigar-smoking, opulently-dressed gamblers are sitting around a card table in a room. The dealer has dealt four cards - the words on the back of each card read: buy and hold, buy and do-up, buy and on-sell, buy and build, joker. A window behind the card-players has on its outside an arrow with a sucker head stuck to the glass and the word "thud" above it. The dealer is saying "Don't worry, they're not serious".

• A group of four cabinet ministers wearing casual clothing is sitting around a table. They are wearing name tags - John, Bill, Nick, Paula. A sign on a door to the room reads "Potty Shed Retreat - Ideas Room". There is a whiteboard behind the table with the heading "Strategies for fixing the housing crisis". There is no other writing on the whiteboard. At the head of the table sits a woman wearing the name tag "Facilitator". A newspaper with the heading "WINZ implicated in garage housing scheme" lies on the table. The facilitator's speech bubble says "So Paula, this was your idea?". Bill is thinking "That's clever - it frees up cars for sleeping in". Nick's thought bubble reads "What about storage container houses?" John's thought bubble has a flag with a garage on it.

Cartoon briefs - hey diddle diddle

• John Key, with a perplexed look on his face, and dressed in a frock and wearing rubber gloves, is standing in a kitchen with a large, half-empty plastic milk bottle in one hand. The milk bottle has a hole in one corner and is leaking a stream of milk onto the floor. An assortment of burnt cakes, spilt ingredients and torn up recipes litter the bench and floor. In his other hand, he is holding open a book. The title of the book is "NZ Economy Cookbook (Chinese Edition)".

• The cartoon is divided in two diagonally. In the top left, a thin, black-singleted cow-cockey with his back to us is walking out a farm gate. He is carrying a suitcase with a label which says "Fonterra's Get Rich Poor Quickly Dairy Farm Package". A fat bankster dressed in a waist-coated suit is standing by the gate grinning from ear to ear. A "Farm Certificate of Title" document protrudes from his pocket. In the bottom right half of the cartoon, Bill English is speaking on the phone - "Don't worry John, they'll still vote for us." A book with the title "Great Political Con Tricks" sits on a coffee table next to Bill. 

• A group of four cabinet ministers wearing casual clothing is sitting around a table. They are wearing name tags - John, Bill, Stephen, Murray. A sign on a door to the room reads "Green Brown Fields Retreat - Ideas Room". There is a whiteboard behind the table with the heading "Strategies for fixing the dairy downturn". There is no other writing on the whiteboard. At the head of the table sits a woman wearing the name tag "Paula Rebstock - Facilitator". A newspaper with the heading "Tourism overtakes Dairy in export earnings" lies on the table. Paula's speech bubble says "No Stephen, we can't make every tourist buy a can of milk powder as an entry tax". Murray's thought bubble reads "How about a sheep farm then?" Bill is thinking "We should make it 2 cans". John's thought bubble has a flag with a cow on it. Stephen looks as though he is sulking.

Tuesday Poem: Cloth Cap commutes

Yesterday, the Humourless Seinfeld spammed his audience with
an endless tweet, an unlikeable Facebook post, an audible Feltron Report.
Despite his best efforts, Cloth Cap couldn't shut out the confounding sound
so the Chopin-playing pianist hung his head, stopped playing.

Today the Humourless Seinfeld and his listening post sit two rows back.
Cloth Cap can still hear him inside his string phones, can hear him
sliming the 1812 overture, lowering the lifting of Napoleon's siege
of Moscow, spiking the guns, muffling the bells.

Tomorrow, Cloth Cap will magnanimously provide HS and his companion
with their own bus, TV producer, camera crew, and direct feeds to all
the world's reality shows. Cloth Cap will refuse resulting YouTube clip
advertising royalties and smile while he listens to Vivaldi.




Three and a half years of bus commuting have provided a lot of material for Cloth Cap. I don't think it will be his last reflection.

Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.

Tuesday Poem: The Head of Department's Prayer on a change of Government

Our Minister, who art in cabinet,
hallowed be thy name.
Thy party won,
thy will be done,
in fact as it is in fiction.
Give us this day your empty signifiers,
And cover our stuff-ups,
as we cover yours when you pot us.
And lead us not into the glare of scrutiny,
but deliver us from scarce resources.
For thine is the government,
the power and the spin,
at least until the next election.

Amen/Awomen


I have always been a great admirer of Whim Wham, which was the pen-name the great New Zealand poet Allen Curnow used when he wrote his weekly and extremely long-running satirical poetry column in the Christchurch Press and then the New Zealand Herald. Unfortunately, satire is not the current flavour of the poetic month but I'm sure it will make a return one day.

The Head of Department's Prayer is one of my attempts in the genre and pokes some fun at our Mandarins.

Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.

Tuesday Poem: Misinterpretations of two sessions at Writers and Readers Week, 2008

Bill introduced Paul. He said Paul is possibly the planet’s pre-eminent poet

Princeton poetry professor, a prodigy, prolific.  Paul didn’t demur.

I don’t think Paul is a morning person.  He brought about four of his

published works on stage with him.  He hadn’t used post-its to mark

the poems he was going to read.  Bill said Paul said poets try to re-write

the work of past poets when writing new poetry.  Or something like that.

(Harold once said something similar in a different way – didn’t he?)

Paul thought a nine-thirty in the morning reading was a bit different.

He waffled a bit while trying to find the poems he was going to read.

I don’t think Bill is a morning person either.  He didn’t ask questions

when Paul left him gaps to do so.  So Paul waffled a bit more.  It was

a little disconcerting.  Perhaps there had been a welcome party the night

before.  Paul was disconcerted by the jackhammers behind the stage.

Paul’s poems were good.  Bill thought we should hear some songs written

by Paul and played by the guitar band he’s in.  I’m not sure who was singing.

Some people got up and left then.  Paul finished with a witty comment

about poetry.  I suspect he’s used it at other readings.  Everybody clapped.

Bill said to stay seated while Paul and he exited.  More got up and left then.

Christian said he is a ‘sound’ poet.  He read several poems very loudly.

Some people put their fingers in their ears.  A few got up and left.

Most of the poems he read didn’t have intelligible words in them. Christian won

a very big award and lots of money for writing some long prose poems.

All the words in each poem have only the same one vowel in them.  Christian said

he doesn’t write conventional poetry because he doesn’t want to inflict his ego

on anyone.  ‘Chapter i’ was the single-vowel prose poem he chose to read to us.

He said it was his favourite chapter.  Christian is conducting a GE project

in which he will alter the genetic structure of a microbe by implanting a

mirror cipher on its genome.  The cipher will write a poem.  When the microbe

regenerates, new poems will get written on the genomes of the offspring.

He thinks this will be a nearly foolproof way of communicating the high points of

human culture to ET beings who find our planet.  Christian doesn’t seem to be into

GE ethics, unintended biosphere-experiment consequences, or planetary safety.

I mean, what if all the poems the mutant microbes write are really, really bad?

I went to my first 2012 Wellington Festival Writers and Readers Week event today. It was really good then I remembered the 2008 Festival and a poem I had written after attending a couple of the readings.  Visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.