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Waking Child

As you murmur in waking
All you see is not mine to know
Feeling with living hands
for the edge of your world
As you once searched
for the blinding light of birth

With each waking second
your world grows
With every breath
your universe expands

My selfish heart waits
to capture your future
to know your plan
And every sound you make
will be mine to learn
but never understand

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Telegraph Point

Blazed dark on the white wood
the name revives me from the city's stupor
For the weeds have known us both
and the grey road has grown a beard

Where my father and I woke to the gum tree dawn
and the smell of the wet road
We strolled beside the highway to the rattling bridge
that lived in the mist

You tucked your secrets in my bag of dreams as I slept
I still dream of the campfire's scent
where the bending road meets the river

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Old Suburb

I recognise every crack in the footpath
The houses once real and coloured
now like old photographs

I tremble

The ghosts lie inside
I walk faster in case the past grabs me
and pulls me into it's sickly trap

The old widows (those that are left)
sit on their porches to catch the breeze
that eddies down the street
They remember me

I hurry away

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Dawn Service

The Cenotaph
grey streaked stone crumbling
once hewn bright and golden yellow
from river cliffs that men loved

Names mute
on a marble tablet
like a guest list to a grand party
have faded
as the stone has blackened
with generations of rain

I always read them
not knowing one from the other
but that they should be read

Young men in fresh uniform
witness tributes to fathers and sons
their gaze averts the blank page
that awaits inscription

The Ode cuts night to dawn
the sinking silence of recent battle
greets the sun

So forgive us old man
if today we cherish each moment of peace
Lest we forget the obscenity of war


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November Sunset

Sun sabres slice the landscape
turning the lake to fire
like an eyeglass in a blacksmith's furnace
it's blinding whiteness drags me
to witness it's fierce sacrifice
Sugarloaf sears under the closeness of the sun's glance
the gums crackle beneath it's angry passing

I leave the lake and seek the river
whose blossom holds the twilight scent
The sun sets hissing
Sweet oil of the gums sprayquenches the shadows
and the air is full of the bush

I follow where I saw it go
hoping for the smell of rain on scorched earth
that speaks to well worn leather
and the roadside crunching under my feet

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Child in Time

In memory of the toddler who tragically fell off cliffs at Shepherds Hill Newcastle

Like a butterfly
we had only a glimpse of you
a moment to love you
Spun lightly from threads of air and dust
you fall as through a dream
and wake before the end

We hear the silver gull on the wind
and from the rocks over and under
a wing's blade slicing the cold air
to soar above

Should we grieve for you
our falling angel
for our love transforms you
Your cry becomes the song of sunrise
Your tiny broken wings wildflowers on the sandstone cliff
your fear the watchful eye of a silent bird

(For the Hannan family)

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Mum

Scarcely a day goes by
when I don't think of you
You were there (it seemed)
every day of my early years
Then you were gone
That black hole that grew through my teenage years
I never really saw
until now
(Teenagers are tough aren't they)

You sit with me as I write
and listen to this music
descending and rising
like a flood of tears long restrained

(1996)