Cameron Fuller

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Cameron Fuller was born on the shores of Lake Burley Griffin in Canberra. He has lived in Brisbane, Sydney and Cairns, but keeps returning to Adelaide, where he has done most of his living and writing. Having studied at five universities in three states, he holds a degree at the University of Queensland and has recently completed Honours in Professional Writing and Communication at the University of South Australia. His first collection, low background noise, is published in Friendly Street New Poets Eleven.

Adelaide from a near distance

Driving through the hills at dusk,
we see at every curve a different angle of the city.
Our talk turns to carving a meaning from life:

you imagine the world beyond these hills;
I keep looking at the city, already sparkling
orange and white. The road is dark and full of turns,

and our words give way to laughter.
The broken radio dial stuck on easy-listening.
After an hour of Air Supply, Celine Dion, Reo Speedwagon …

we become delirious. We twist bad lines into even worse ones:
Our love soars over mountain tops––or at least Mount Lofty;
The moon glows just for you and me––and six billion others.

Life reduced to a three-minute love song,
we descend to the city, and soon, I know,
the street lights will wash over your face as you sleep.

And with the radio turned off, and the car humming quietly,
my eyes will turn between you and the road,
knowing our place in the world is clear for at least one more night.

From low background noise, New Poets 11

20 : 80

a cola brand’s budget for advertising bulges over twelve african GDPs as six billion consumers squeeze fruit in the global supermarket one point two clear the shelves four point eight rummage for leftovers while searching for a cure for boredom researchers have discovered the number of grams of chocolate required to fill the emptiness of a western lifestyle is greater than or equal to the number of hours the average person spends pushing a shopping trolley over a lifetime decreases in the latest rates of happiness have reinforced fears the gap between those with and without is widening causing many to queue for handouts to calculate the value of cosmetic surgery worldwide just multiply the number of beggars by the number of land mines and divide by the number of missing limbs incoming reports from california confirm that you are unique the barcode tattooed on your genitalia distinguishes you from your clones in response to falling literacy levels popular magazines will publish only in the language of kilos and calories while dress size now determines success the wholesale theft of self esteem is not reported in tonight’s news somewhere between a tax rise and the latest list of injured footballers tens of thousands die in an earthquake in a fourth world country as talkback lines overheat with angry taxpayers one resilient american kid delivers a tear to the eyes of millions

From low background noise, New Poets 11

America

America, your humour doesn’t always translate
into mass laughter. In other words,
your sitcoms give me the shits,
and I’m tired of watching those punch lines
roll in across the Pacific.
America, I hate to tell you,
your shows about losing weight in a boot camp:
they’re not popular in Ethiopia.
The more you lose in pounds, the more you gain in confidence,
and, America, that’s something you don’t need more of.
Hi America, I’m the next American Idol. No, I am. No, I am.
I hear this year’s Rwandan Idol won’t be televised.
America, you see yourself as bold and beautiful,
but I know there’s more to you
than perfect hair and perfect teeth.
You say your mind is free
even though you still believe
that heroes have American accents
while villains are marked by foreign inflections
and a love of bad moustaches.
America, you were the one voted most likely to succeed,
but who are you now?
John Wayne riding in the deserts
of Iraq, smiling one minute, killing the next?
Or an eccentric genius,
using the world as a theatre
for your dramas of crime and law at one end,
your games of war at the other?
America, will there be a CSI Baghdad?
I hear the next Survivor
is being filmed on Guantanamo Bay.
I hear the next Hollywood blockbuster
features A-list actors in uniform
and a CGI invasion of both Iran and Syria.
With all that bursting energy,
no wonder cheerleaders wave their pom-poms on the sidelines
even when you drop bombs on crowded cities.
But America, that narrative
of good versus evil is getting old,
and fans are turning away,
faster than you can slap on
a happy ending.

From low background noise, New Poets 11