The Uniting

Tony's Barber Shop. What neighbourhood does not have a Tony's Barber Shop. The price caught my attention first. A board in front, $21 for a men's cut. Skeptical I turned to see a shop full of people. We're either all cheapskates or the place is good. Hopefully the latter.

Sit there waves the man who appears in charge. Tony, thinks I. No his name is Rudy and he does own the shop. Has since coming here in the late eighties. A Ukrainian conscript performing his central service in the Volga suddenly unemployed by glasnost. He and fellow soldiers made a run for a western country and Australia was the beneficiary. Rudy bought the shop from Tony.

Rudy has three chairs. His is by the window where he can greet customers, direct who goes where, and can keep an eye on the register. Cash only. There's a fourth barber's chair at the register. A cross dresser is seated there waiting for a shave. He's dressed to the nines in a fine short dress with fish net stockings and gold stilettos. A bright pink wig is in his lap, waiting to be popped on once his head is shaved bare. He has to wait his turn as he only trusts Rudy’s blade. Rudy informs him I am next and then him, even though I was there after him. No worries he says in a thick Russian accent.

The chair to Rudy’s left, the centre chair, is controlled by an Indian woman. Her bright clothes and cheery banter adding to the brightness started by cross dresser guy. She gets the boys (no girls come here) and short men. Even then she has to stand on a stool to reach the top of the handsome Laotian teen she is trimming. His mother is trying to keep a younger brother out of trouble, her broken English struggling to say the words, older brother filling in the blanks for her.

The last chair is run by a Moroccan. He's a quiet man, quick with scissors and razor. He has completed two heads to one each from his colleagues. He has a big toothy grin. Each tooth with dark empty gaps between. His dark eyes taking in all. A happy hum.

Beside him his next customer, an old Greek man. Another Russian, though staidly dressed, me, and between me and Laotian mom, a Jew.  He owns the jewellery shop up the road. This week he hung going out of business signs and a for sale notice.

“I hope you aren't selling to the Chinese” says the Greek. They're coming in. Two weeks ago they took over the Church. Took down all the English signs and put up their language. A debate was entered. I, now in Rudy’s chair sat fearfully still while Rudy opined about the merits of the Chinese coming to the neighbourhood while scraping bits of errant hair from my back, necks, and jowls. His opinions were met with concurrence and disagreement.

The debate fell into awkward silence. India woman broke it: “They took the derelict Uniting Church and fixed the bell tower, painted the trim and doors, fixed the landscape, replaced the fence, and paved the lot. They have advertising in all our languages inviting us to their Church. They are offering free English lessons. They might be Chinese but they are uniting. They will be good neighbours. They are just like us.

And we all agree. A shop full of immigrants uniting in our acceptance, feeling welcome with each other in this land. 

Bound

There, is this place

Wrapped in ornate card

A thin piece of leather

The remains of a spirit sacrificed

To seal this journal

With the pages stories

Strung together

In layers of truth

And lies

And misconceptions

With love

And heart break

My children are all within

The ones I grew with

Battled and defended

Profound the dangers

We prevailed to slay or allay

The haunting of lineage

My children grown from the uncertainty

My doubts never of them

To blossom their stories

And my children mine

The blessing beyond reproach

All love and support

For me and beyond

My truths hidden from you

A shield protection

To bring you forward

With lineage blessings

God’s gift for me, for you, for your mother

Shared and unshared

Supported as best I can

Where some say selfishly

To fill the emptiness within

With children from my day

Those who know me and quietly understand

Who will love me and will stand with me to fight the ghosts

That will close my pages

Bound I am

To you all

This tome of tales

Romances, comedies

Love stories, and tragedies

They stand the test

While these pages continue their long purposed turn

I will stand for just

I will live for pure

I am here

Your brother

Your father
All this love

ache

it niggles at me constantly

sometimes great sometimes small

how oh how did I get it so wrong

that anyone could stoop so low

so to threaten their own

to derive failure over another.

yet will you ever be satisfied

never says I

the hunger and thirst to get even

compels your very existence

at the detriment of all others

and then you wonder where the love went

I watch from afar trapped

my very blood waning while I remain

a helpless now hapless soul

confirmed in your very actions

the type of person you truly are

I know then my steps were correct

he may perish and never again will I see him

penalised by deception and greed

wronged by hatred left so long gone

I ache for you cause I was so wrong

were you not a good person at one time

where did that person go?

The Dud

To have bombed

And not connected

No failure of launch

The failsafe switches

An immediate

Safe turn to off

To code them on again

Requires two keys

Impassive peace reins then

A truce beholden

The blue aftermath

A first response

Classically conditioned

Learned and placated

The dud turns within

Sensitive the role

Perspicacity the valour side of better

Di

Di

Double take again, dis

Lessened of course to an insult

With added function

Eliding to discourse untended

If intended then disturbed

Is that multiplicity of incensed

- thought -

you understood the collective figurative

triangulated n=1 though there is no won

equals more

as do other geometries

this simple slight

of(f) hand

adds to the dimensional focus

albeit latitudinal it may go in every direction

sort of(f) course

your approach a disciplined reproach

designed to cause me to die

right away 

if possible but there’s added disturbance

this truth 

the distance much greater

than geographical discoursed

the life force that moves me

is also the one that will pull

this ethereal body from the precipice black pull

of vengeful tactic of damning abnormality

to factual normality 

this joy

di-fold? dis fold?

nay 501 and then some

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jekyll my Hyde

well then

or not

evidently

how can I put into words

when the words cannot be there

how can I contain the hurt

when to release would expose me

my being my rules

these bind me together

tightly strung

emotionally aware

emotionally bereft

evidently

this mortal coil varies

unique among each of mortality

thwarting connection

by rendering low the being  

well then

no use crying further

to move forward is an imperative

unwrapped and unwound

the wounded left a flower placed

apology does not seem suited

though it is tried

a hollow render of this reflective self
and reasoned excuse an unrepentant loss

yet nevertheless

lost

Tired

Been at it so long

So hard. Too hard. 

All that energy. 

Expended

For what

There was effort

I've done my best

And I sure hoped it was enough. 

It wasn't of course

For everyone

They the relentless

Never content. 

Until the tired

Becomes unending sleep

I am tired  

Too tired

For now.