our Civilisation
is bAsed
on a shaky suPply
of chEap crude oil
what onCe took
an hOur and a half to drive
will take fOur or five days
to walK again
wAlking opens the senses
inviteS intimacy
and begs for Knowledge
It makes aware
our aNimal skins
our enerGetic bodies
walking is a peRformance
poEms written
by thE ink
of our Feet
thiS bodily geopoetics
predates the ploUgh
aNd polis
and paGe
songlines predAte civility’s invasion
kNowledges sung
anD walked barefoot
this wAs when the earth was soft
nurtured by perennial Grasses
and lovEd soil
Today the ground is hard
cut and compactEd
shoes are Needed
to walk counTry
Shoes and ploughs
fences And maps
are techNics of trauma
of Dispossession
Such civility is coercively brutal
and has disappEared
the generAtive knowledges
our car Feet are damaged
walking tO the city
shOes have deformed
our ecological wiTs
but walking can reperfOrm
what’s crudely leFt
of a pre-liTerate commons
makE sung lines of thought
possible agaiN
these walked poems Are without pages’ clocks
aNd the many ensnaring devices
of civilitY
they are becOming literate of land again
and begin to vaLue
a return to knowleDge —
civility’s prostheses Are not intelligent
we belonG to the most destructive culture
Ever to exist