23 May 2025
get the orchids right *
you stole my truth, what truth? you said,
and the water’s won’t recede the
imagined insights from all comers in this
freestyle wrassling ring will ring it round
with cusses, thumps of bulk on canvas
and a whacky loss of authority
when it comes to climate clang
hell who denies when nothing
can be done? my only hope being clawback
but in another rift our only hope is
drawing the faces of influencers
gamifying themselves enough to
nuke their aunties and their grans with
smiles smiles smiles and miles of
cosmetic this and smothered that
as in small humans in far countries,
rich humus in near, and levitating
what little hope they had up up
into the dark of oligarchs’ relentless
hunger to pretend the future’s theirs
* from ‘Get the orchids right and the rest of the ecosystem will follow’: Professor Kingsley Dixon (Wikipedia), referring to the appearance of the Great Sun Orchid’s appearance at the Chelsea Flower Show, when talking with Samantha Donovan on ABC Radio 23 May 2025; more context: ‘But at Chelsea this year, it bloomed months out of season, thousands of kilometres from its natural habitat, in a completely different climate.’ quoted from ‘Aussie orchid turns heads at London's prestigious Chelsea Flower Show’: story by Syan Vallance in London accessed 23 May 2025