Inspired by ‘Is this the Azure Kingfisher’ Sarah St Vincent Welch
the recent burials
last year it was a friend’s dog
old fella still warm
her child’s best friend
one of her family
bundled and wrapped
we were weak
the soil clay
we smiled at just how weak
we were
my cracking body
could still pick axe
with a shallow swing
chisel head drag
into fractured rock
we made a superficial grave
anchored it with broken bricks
La Niña keened over Queanbeyan
we talked on the verandah
the wind rattled the carport loose
we remembered that a fox
tried to dig up the bird
that drowned in our lazy rain-filled bucket
the bird grave in our front garden
today a felled cockatoo
beside the road
her yellow crest still raised
we saw her at dusk
we dug by torchlight
remembered
how the cockies talked to us
when we visited this house
swinging upside down
us looking up to hear
just who do you think you are,
who?