L

My parents know me better than I know myself. Someone who learned the hard way. I learned much later in life. Yaya wrung the neck of the hen then chopped off its head. Did a headless dash. Our bloodied driveway. Never met anyone so fascinated with rust, who took me to warehouses, cemeteries and shipping yards. We hurled stones in La RIve Gauche. All that hard work was framed and hidden underneath the bed, where it could no longer be seen. Discontinued my studies. Removed my designation. Left my scribble in his postbox where it remained unread. Walis tingting. He wouldn’t sit in the cinema after the movie had begun. I re-watched Tan Lines isolated in spirit. He never forgot my face but couldn’t remember my name. 

Trafalgar Place
ruts in the road
painted along the gutter
All Drains Lead To Troy Gully
and on Wirraway Close
a dented No Through Road sign
An old house was torn down
leaving nothing but a jade plant
like the stark withered tree
outside Dan Murphy’s
the corner
of Windsor Parade

There is manual labour and there is drinking
and words within words
Are you okay?

Wrecked farm equipment with webbings of dead 
grass
in the open fields of Lazy River Estate …
the overhanging foliage
… more than twenty kilometres out of town
on the old Dubbo Road
was the pistol club.
I had only been a few times.
Luke told me I could get a One Month Membership.

They all said I showed potential.
There were three ranges:
a couple for the .22 calibre and one for the smaller 
air pistol.
It was fun shooting targets every Sunday.
5 bullets. 4 rounds. Timed.

One day some random guy walked in …
paid his membership and went outside.
He loaded the gun …
put the barrel in his mouth and blasted out the back 
of his skull.
But that was not the reason I never went back.
I just lost interest.

I never saw Luke much afterwards either.

Boys getting stoned and jumping off the cliff
into the deepest part of the river;
no one knows for sure how deep.
See you in Cobar! we shouted, as we drifted away 
downstream.x

Flocks of cockatoos screeched as they flew over the 
slopes,
the dirt road and metal posts,
fallen logs and blue-green algae,
dead ryegrass undulating.

I nearly drowned fighting the current as I tried to 
cross back,
tussled in the willows, vines and throwing up.
Blistered and scarred for seven days.

Devil means Bunyip and Evil Spirit Dreaming.
The elders frightened the children with ghost stories
to save them from drowning near the bend in the 
river.
It’s a strange bed up north, said Gazza.

Jason and Craig saw a kingfisher on the fence,
You can tell them by their pointed beaks.
I spotted a pelican on the water’s surface,
It must be lost.

summer holiday

we pitch a tent in your nan’s 

front yard

an argument 

on the northerly wind

our pitched tent

overcast evening 

I hide her car keys 

in my underwear