I was going to put this up tomorrow, but since everyone else is reporting it, It better go up now. ie, the moronic tardation of Gina Rhinehart in verse form. In one sense it forms a kind of bad poetry precinct, standing as it does at the other end of the small street which is graced by the walrus. So it could be some kind of bad poetry Champs Elysee. Gina actually makes the walrus poetry sound good. (Following the pics is an extensive critique by Natalia Fan#1)
Contrast Gina’s
“Is our future threatened with massive debts run up by political hacks
Who dig themselves out by unleashing rampant tax…”
with
“Into Time, Into the Dream
The Moon and the Sun
Only from within can this love shine”
from the walrus.
Nice to see that a Chinese dude taking a pinch some of the iron ore that will end up in China anyway.
A critique by Natalia Fan#1
It is said that money talks and bullshit walks, and it is difficult to conceive any greater illustration of this maxim than Gina Rinehart’s new poem, succeeding as it does to do both. Far more so than with Banjo Patterson, or even the great Nanushka for that matter, in Rinehart Australian poetry now has a force to be reckoned with. As though dragged from a super pit and hastily sand-blasted, this rough-hewn gem of a poem is perfectly apposite to the urgent sentiments it expresses. Indeed, no Australian poem I know has seemed so urgent in terms of either message or delivery. Through its absence of punctuation the reader cannot help but hear the overweight magnate’s shallow breathlessness.
The decision to write in unevenly metered heroic couplets is suggestive less of an amateur’s hand than of the heroism and noblesse which the rhyme scheme usually connotes, while the poet’s orderly use of alexandrine in the poem’s first two lines ironically signals how our current precarious position is indeed the order of the present day:
The globe is sadly groaning with debt, poverty and strife
And billions now are pleading to enjoy are [sic] better life
Hence it is all the more poignant that the sprung rhythm of the third line should suggest that order’s breakdown, all the while intimating possible redemption:
Their hope lies with resources buried deep within the earth
Sprung rhythm as we know has its own order; a kind of order-in-disorder which in this case mirrors the poet’s desire for deregulation rather than the straightjacket regimen of taxation and law. This regimen is given voice in the poem’s fourth and fifth lines, which with considerable continued irony emulates the petty managerial speak of both business and politics, their seven feet per line scheme suggesting the kind of dissembling talkiness characteristic of the “political hacks” against whom the poet fulminates:
And the enterprise and capital which give each project worth
Is our future threatened with massive debts run up by political hacks
This glib loquaciousness is brought up short by the relative pithiness of the sixth line’s pentameter:
Who dig themselves out by unleashing rampant tax
The effect is repeated without outstaying its welcome with the seventh and eighth lines, in which a rambling eight foot line is once again replied to in pentameter:
The end result is sending Australian investment, growth and jobs offshore
This type of direction is harmful to our core
The only seemingly aleatory structure of the poem’s middle section almost directly represents the agonistic contest of free-thinking entrepreneur and incompetent politician. A dialogue of sorts is subtly set in motion, the slack facility of the politician’s tongue brought up short each time by the miner-poet’s rejoinder, as once again occurs in lines thirteen and fourteen:
Develop North Australia, embrace multiculturalism and welcome short term foreign workers to our shores
To benefit from the export of our minerals and ores
The repetition here of the awr rhyme first heard in lines seven and eight sets up fruitful associations between “shore”, “ore”, and “core”. As Australians our core identity and values are at one with the kind of core “buried deep within the earth” (3), awaiting the miner’s drill just as our both mineral and multicultural potential waits to be unleashed, instead of the “rampant tax” (6) that would otherwise stifle it. The contrast between the “miners, workers and related industries” (12) and the “envious unthinking people” (9) who would hold us back could not be more stark at this point, with the thudding alliteration of the twelfth line’s second half (“related industries who strive to build the world”) reinforcing the hard-earned prerogative of the “worker”, and by extension the bosses. Moreover, the truly illuminating contrast between the “globe” of the poem’s opening line and the “world” as it now appears should not go unnoticed, forming as it does another crucial element of the poem’s dialectic, whereby the “globe”, as something circumscribed and thus regulable, vies with an alternate conception of “world”; of horizon and thus of possibility.
The final line, in all its twelve feet, is really two, thus reprising the poem’s initial couplet, together with its intimation of order. From what was once pernicious a new and perhaps for the first time inclusive order has been wrung: that of the “special economic zones and wiser government” which would not put aside the “world’s poor” (15), who now stand to gain through their enfranchisement as “foreign workers”, however “short term” (13). The breadth and largesse of Rinehart’s poetic vision is at this point simply breathtaking, and forms and apt conclusion to her heartfelt plea for economic and moreover social justice.
That modern poets are most often perceived as hermetic obscurants by the general public means that the eventual public context of Rinehart’s poem – etched on a plaque decorating the poet-donated rock which will eventually take its place outside a popular new market – should not go unremarked. As our new people’s poet reminds us, a truly free market would surely be the rock on which a free and prosperous Australia could be founded, and on which the unreasonable and unnecessary restraints imposed by the self-appointed social engineers and moral guardians who rule our land would just as surely founder.
The Worst of Perth 
Is ‘Rineharting’ the new ‘Wintoning?’
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Please, say it ain’t so?!!
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I think my favourite bit is ‘and related industries’
there is nothing quite like being lectured about poverty by the nation’s richest woman, and told that everyone else’s poverty would be lessened if she were to be taxed less.
come the revolution she’ll be stood against that rock and shot
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and then eaten.
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let them eat yellowcake
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I havent laughed so much for ages
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is that Chinese bloke in the photo trying to see if the rock is edible?
that’s what Gina feeds guest workers in the Pilbara, you know.
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I was sure he was going to stub out his ciggie. Sadly no. Btw Gina’s name wasn’t on it I don’t think.
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I think that someone told him iron ore is an aphrodisiac as a bit of a wind up. Still if it saves a rhinocerous, tiger or a bear who are we to tell him otherwise?
Please help yourself Sir. Tell your friends.
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I think TWOP needs to start a grassroots movement to install La Gina as our great state’s poet laureate.
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My critique hopefully a first step in this direction…
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Your critique is nothing short of brilliant.
I wept.
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Whose Future? Some thoughts on the idle rich
The China boom is where it’s at
Especially for those who have turned out fat
After extracting dirts from Aussie ground
And sucking up new profits found
At the top of the list is my friend Gina
A bigger miser you have never seena
That, of course, comes from her kin
As their gripes with mum cause much public din
And then we have our mate Clive Palmer
Whose muddled rhetoric doesn’t seem much calmer
As he berates those clowns who fail to understand
Why it is so important to dig up the land
Finally there’s Andrew Forrest – the one that we call Twiggy
As far as household bank accounts go, he sure has a biggie
He’ll scrape as much of the topography off as he can
And leave a scar in our fabulous north the size of Japan
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Because sometimes an expert opinion is useful, and we can “wait or see” to see how La Gina will next express herself creatively.
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gina rinehart is a woman you cant ignore
she got f..king rich thanks to daddy finding large tracks of iron ore
more chins than chinese phone book plus 3 of her kids are giving her the shits
it is rumoured in her younger days,for extra cash,she used to xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx!!!
more money than a 3rd world country,gina is a walking ATM from her head to the toes
but she gets f..king angry if people mention her ex step mum Rose
the bain of ginas life,even after poor lang was dead
the Philippino housekeeper who couldnt clean but….gxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx!!!
gina likes to think she is normal, true aussie from beggining to the end
loves a bit of telly so on a whim she thought f..k it i will buy half of ch10
in closing dear gina your a darl,but some of your skills need more than lady luck
for your poetry writting skills there is only one word…………………..FUCKED
Yeah. Sorry I had to x some of that.
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Of a shit poet there is no more certain sign,
Than the reversal of sentences to produce a rhyme
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Yoda poetry called it is
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iambic pentameter?
http://www.crikey.com.au/?p=273926
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I thought some of the metaphysical imagery was really rather good,
and interesting rhythmic devices which seem to counterpoint the surrealism of the underlying metaphor.
I doubt there will ever again be anything this worst. I think the high-water mark of TWOP has been wintoned. Never will the ooshta be so strong and vibrant as this epic She Ra moment.
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PS I forgot to attribute my poetry critique to it’s creator Douglas Adams. It refers of course to Vogon poetry which is acknowledged as the second worst in the universe. I think we have a new first.
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no, John Laws’ poetry is the worst. I have two volumes of his poetry at home. I shall post some later.
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I am kind of glad I am on the beautiful island and largely unaware of this atrocity.
I may post haiku later about swimming with garfish, though.
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I think you may be right, skink, although the artist of this iron ore sculpture has captured Gina’s likeness perfectly.
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Let’s buy an orange car with a slit in the roof
I want the slit in the roof because
that might just let some sun in.
And the sun’s pretty powerful and
that might just let some fun in too.
Apart from that, with a slit in the roof
of your orange car
you would find it much easier to commune
with nature,
and if the sun’s on your face
it won’t seem so bad if you grate your gears.
Apart from that a bird might fly in.
Somebody once said that a bird in the car
is worth a slit in the roof.
John Laws
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with poetry from Gina and a ballpoint vagina
it’s a fannytastic day for the Pilbara miner.
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I wonder how much she would pay to buy the Vatican.
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I can’t help but feel that if this masterpiece had come to light a few months ago, we’d have a mineral resource rent tax by now, and Julia would be riding high in the polls.
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They need to pedestrian the street between gina and walrus.
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Dude – buy a verb.
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Now you’re talking. Would need a suitably cosmopolitan name. Perhaps ‘Royal Mile’, or maybe ‘Federation Square’.
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Don’t you mean “Secessionist Square”?
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Oh, I see you already nominated Champs Elysee[s]. As you were.
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Fuck I hate Gina.
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‘gold’
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No, Iron Ore.
I can’t get over the fact that no-one she showed this to had the courage to tell her the truth…
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You may assume too much there, ie. that she showed it to anyone capable of discerning the truth. I mean yes it’s screamingly awful but I imagine responses of ‘yairs ya nailed it Gina, thank God someone’s got the guts to tell it how it is’ are sincere
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I.e. half the comments on Perth Now
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I like to think all the iron ore she sells comes with a poem. This rock just happens to be on display.
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I’d imagine most of it is pretty basic, however:
“You wanted a shitload of iron ore?
Here it is and remember – we’ve got more!”
Maybe printed on a coupon for Grape Nuts.
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Kids want me in court.
Court. Just an unthinking hack.
His son had nice hair.
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No worries mate – our
Primary industry’s fruit
Sell it back to us
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There once was a woman called Gina
Whose father was quite the miner
And on a large lump of ore
In a car park in Mor
ley, she showed us she’s quite the rhymer.
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Enjambment rocks!
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Dog Rock?
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No.
Doggerel Rock.
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surely the rock is the Smith’s sculpture of Gina, I mean its anatomically perfect
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Roses are red
Violets are blue
Gina hates tax
The gub’mint should too?
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I’ll just leave this here:
http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/48073755
For old time’s sake.
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19 Feb 1975 – Gough turns down invitation to Gina’s 21st birthday party
11 Nov 1975 – Gough sacked as PM
9 months is bloody slow turnaround – no wonder she is buying out the media.
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nauseating
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Although Greg’s idea of dancing as a “waste of energy” is refreshing.
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There was a women called Gina
the daughter of the late Hancock
She started her media empire
With a poem on a rock.
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Forget about the nation state , it’s run its course,
its met its fate,
Old Marx knew a thing or too about the entreprenoo,
open your arms to the hindoo, the chinee too,
cheap as chips and back in the donger after use,
no need for drug testing
just give em mass disinfecting,
multicultual up your arse till time to go home,
cheap workers on loan,
At the end of all this Gina will be the richest person on the planet,
Richer even than some Mexican drug bandit,
To remember my little pome print on toilet paper,
then the face that stares back at you Gina will be your own.
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By Piggy Minedust and the Poets in Cars
Geen Gina lives on the back,
of Chinese steel mills, smoke up the stack.
She’s quite kooky – she puts on a show,
Geen Gina has let herself go.
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Craig Reucassel on Q&A
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Give us a Kevin Bloody Wilson cover.
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Yes, where is it, TLA? Stop talking about your degree and get to work.
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The days you are away coincide with the biggest week for stats in years. Why don’t you do a KBW cover?
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And frighten the hordes away? OK.
But who is this KBW of whom you speak? A Neruda compadre?
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My niece translated the first two lines into Marseille French. Now I totally get it. (Add your own grunting and spitting Marse style)
The globe is sadly groaning with debt, poverty and strife
And billions now are pleading to enjoy a better life
la dette, le pauvreté, et le conflit font que le monde grogne avec malheur,
et les milliards plaident maintenant d’avoir une vie meilleure
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Superbe.
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“Consider Straya as a hole
she is a fickle land.
She looks a brown and wrinkled moll
but there’s wealth beneath her sand.
We should treat her like a Lady
give her all that she deserves,
caress her with a grader
and sample-drill her curves.
We’ll scour her flanks and contours
with our strong magnetic fields,
then poke our seismic probes in deep,
to see what she might yield..
We’ll sink our shafts,
plunge down and in
and steal her secret riches.
We’ll pump her full of bitter seed
and take lots of dirty pictures.
‘Cause nothin turns us on
like Gina’s wide open-cut.”
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Lovely – coming to a bronze plaque stuck on an ugly fucking boulder outside your local market megaplex soon.
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Thats a lot of writing on that plaque.
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That is not writing…
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I doubt Truman Capote would even elevate it to typing.
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Looks like her latest creativity is about to be unleashed:
http://www.danilic.com/the-sydney-mining-herald-fairfaxs-future/
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It would look like that if run by anybody from Perth.
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i think you have all missed the point. here is a person driven by success. what has been achieved with this work is not only the NUMBER ONE piece of (?) displaying the worst of Perth, it is the NUMBER ONE piece displaying the worst of Australia. We should all be humbled by myopia on such a level. All you people and your mock prose. You are a pack of amateurs. BOW DOWN TO THE MASTER!!!! As i was at a loss for words, i was sure as fuck humbled.
It is sad that Robert Hughes was not alive to comment on it.
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Yes, both Robert Hughes-s could have something to say.
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He probably put it best in The Decline of the City of Mahagonny, the introduction to Nothing If Not Critical; “What strip-mining is to nature, the art market has become to culture”. Or perhaps he summed it all up when he said, “Western Australian justice is to ‘justice’ what Western Australian culture is to ‘culture’.” Vale.
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Peter, it seems you are still more or less at a loss for words.
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Morely?
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Less is Morely.
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shorely it is so.
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