Omar Musa: Here Come the Dogs

Aleks and Jimmy shake their heads in unison. ‘Nah, that shit’s gay as, always singing and shit. That’s not true school. Plus, Solo looks like a tennis instructor,’ says Jimmy.

‘You’re one to talk, you preppy cunt! You’re stuck in the nineties, bro. Music moves on,’ I say.

‘Now, Trem. That’s an MC. Tells it how it is — graff, crime, darkness. Voice is like a fucken. like a diamond cutter,’ says Aleks. ‘Strut too — apocalyptic.’

‘You can’t dance to it, but,’ I counter. ‘That shit’s too serious for me. When it started, hip hop was about getting a party goin’. Sydney shit does that better.’

Jimmy is getting heated. ‘Sydney shit is weird. Their accents sound American. They say “days” like “deez” and “mic” like “mark”. Hate that.’

We laugh.

‘What about a chick?’ I venture. ‘None of us even put one in there.’

‘ Tsk . Ya PC cunt. Been hanging with that femmo girlfriend of yours too much. When chicks rap, I just don’t feel it.’

‘What ’bout Lauryn Hill? Jean Grae?’

‘Aussies, I mean’

‘Layla. Class A.’

The boys shrug. As Aleks leans forward, a blue bead swings on a leather strap around his neck. ‘The Hoods sold more than anyone else,’ he says.

‘Fuck sales. It’s not about sales; it’s about impact and the quality. If you use that argument, you could say Bliss n Eso are more important than Def Wish Cast.’

‘Or Vanilla Ice is better than Kool G Rap.’

Jimmy turns his glittering eyes on me. ‘Those private school boys must’ve taught you about hip hop, ay. That’s why you’re not into the hard shit.’

Cunt.

The private school thing is always Jimmy’s trump card,

no matter what the argument,

and it always works.

Aleks frowns.

‘Fuck. I went for basketball, you know that.’ I say, lamely. Then I return to the name that kicked off the debate — ‘Sin One. Orphan Slang. Fire and Redemption.’

The others nod.

‘Yeah, goes without saying. Should be top of every list. Pity it’s been so long since he released an album,’ says Aleks regretfully.

I look at the five-buck note –

Queen Elizabeth now has a crown of thorns

and a timebomb on her shoulder.

‘You seen our dog yet?’ asks Aleks.

Mercury Fire

Tonight is Mercury Fire’s last race.

He’s our favourite,

the reason we still come to the greyhounds.

It began as a joke –

‘Oi, wanna see bogans in their natural habitat?’

But then we saw him race.

Blind in one eye with a kinked back leg,

he’s smaller than the other dogs,

but somehow he beats all comers.

Every time, he starts slow

but ends with power,

hunger.

We’ve heard that in training

he’s thrown real rabbits and possums to chase

so that he keeps the blood lust up.

An ageing warrior,

close to the end.

We all sit silently,

drinking.

Aleks

We never get to see Aleks.

He’s got a missus, a young daughter

and a house he built himself.

Still, even after all this time,

he has that pirouette of smoke

in his eyes.

At age five he moved here from Macedonia

and despite limited English

quickly established himself

as king of the kids

with his fast, big fists.

At age thirteen he knocked out an English teacher

who tried to make him

spell his name with an ‘x’,

not a ‘ks’.

It was around this time he found

another use for his hands.

One day, when a graff crew from Sydney

painted a wildstyle piece under the bridge

over the river,

Aleks discovered a love

to replace the sweet science

(though if lessons needed to be taught,

cunts needed to learn).

From then on it was burners/

boltcutters/

blackbooks

and

guerilla expeditions to Bunnings

to rack paint cans/

And don’t forget

that rush that makes your dick hard.

The Old Timer

‘When I was in England,

I visited Old TRAFFORD,

the home of MANCHESTER UNITED.’

‘We can hear you, mate –

we’re right here.’

The old timer’s been talking frog shit for nearly

fifteen minutes now.

Sad bastard –

desiccated look of a dedicated drinker.

Threads from a cheap Western –

ten-gallon hat, bolo tie,

spurs on boots.

‘Johnny No-Cash,’ says Aleks in my ear.

I stifle a smile.

‘The coach told me I had the BEST LEFT BOOT

he had ever seen.’

Bullshit artists

come a dime a dozen in this town –

it takes one to know one, ay?

A message from Georgie

Good afternoon, beautiful boy.

In boring lecture having naughty thoughts about u.

Can’t wait 2 c u 2nite. Luv, Porge x

Love?

I pocket the phone.

When’s this race gonna start?

A little something to rev things up

I wipe the top of the cistern

and bring up my hand –

there’s white powder on my palm.

I love doing that.

It’s almost like I’ve busted someone in the act.

Aleks takes out a marker

and writes his tag on the cubicle wall

with a flourish.

JAKEL

Meanwhile, Jimmy racks up

three lines

with a seasoned hand

and his keycard.

My brother Jimmy, who could never

even handle his beer back in the day.

Aleks does a line and blinks.

‘Dearo fucken me! This is good shit, bro. Aryan white.’

I roll up the drawn-on five-buck note

and hoover a line.

The cocaine hits immediately –

a cold zoom in the guts,

a perfectly timed tackle.

I backflip

into a glacial crevasse.

The track

The track smoulders.

Thick lights shine down

holding within them insects

and motes of dust.

The dogs’ feet articulate

on the soil of the holding pen.

In part dieted on honey, vegetable oil and eggs,

their coats glow.

Tinny announcements over the loudspeakers.

The trainers are hand slipping the dogs now,

one hand on the collar

the other arm hooked at the base of

their undercarriages

shuffling them forward into the traps.

Like everyone else,

we riffle and check our betslips.

In the stands,

we can hear the dogs’ high-pitched

whimpers and yelps

as they scrape in the traps.

We begin to cheer.

The race

Bang goes the gun,

zoom goes the artificial rabbit,

off go the hounds

like water out a

sluice.

They are a rumbling mass at first

but as they round the corner

they separate into surreal, spear-headed things

that lope and arch through the air –

feet, dust, sound.

The crowd rises

and we do too,

ten-feet tall and charged with powder,

seeing the race in jittering frames.

Here comes Mercury Fire!

A grey streak of

ribs/

sinew-lashed muscle/

light.

Right down the straight

he looks like a young dog again,

propelled by furious, otherworldly energy.

He’s neck and neck for the lead with

two black hounds,

loping forward, urging/

and we’re screaming, screaming/

‘Come on, boy. COME ON!’

and Mercury Fire is straining onwards

every muscle working for the one goal,

courage and conviction in the blood,

launching over the track for the last time.

He comes in third.

I realise that I’ve been holding my breath

the whole race.