Cook Beleaguered from Zealandia by Dudley Benson

Cook, you look sick
You look green
As green as the ocean that you rode here on
Is dark and deep

Cook, you feel dirty don’t you?
As dirty as the seeds of Neo-Europe
That you carry in your purse, darling

Cook, you are somewhat of a player
Playing both your patrons and
The phantoms of the Antipodes
But Cook, can you as the magus
Curry the favour of the world
As she rolls, falls, cracks and breaks?

High above it all Venus is weeping in transit
While against the clockless years
She turns her back and begins a countdown
There’s a call heard across the waves
An echo received by the silk of the glowworm
Aeons of fossils begin their march
Lamenting the ink of a new world order

Cook, you look sick
You look green
As green as the ocean that you rode here on
Is dark and deep

Cook, you feel guilty don’t you?
As guilty as the dog they hung upon the mast
As an envoy of their mutiny

But now the mana that you had
Is dripping off your jaw
Like a well-cooked cut of rotten meat
And there, between the gristle and bone
Is the promise of a continent of
Industry, in-breds and injoking

But with the great big map we made
In our own special colouring contest
You know we’re heading for the edge
And for the fall that will swallow our babies

Now that the gloss has all but gone
And we’re not pulling tricks like we used to
Why are we stuck in the middle of this nowhere
As the clouds form around our heads?

Patiently standing at our side
Our friends with the taiaha are waiting in limbo
We wonder why the sundial is reading night
But fear in our hearts Victoria’s shadow

Is it an island?

• Alternative
• Electronic
• New Zealand
• indie pop
• singer-songwriter
• Melbourne