Janice Bostock

MUSEUM PEACE

Melbourne has the stuffed hide but Wellington

has the skeleton of Phar Lap.

a break in the wind entices

us to visit Te Papa

a modern-day museum

the wonders of which seem

as endless as the summer

days of first love

when we were driven by rain

indoors to the old

Melbourne Museum

where images we had

not dreamed of stared back at us

from jars of ageing light

it was said old men

who had no home crept

in at closing time

to welcome warmth and shelter

for another night

afraid i fled from shadows

the glazed eyes of snakes

and the nakedness

of a human foetus

i paused

in front of a case

containing a large creature

with gentle eyes

and velvet hide

a farmer’s daughter

i understood

the pride of a nation

encased by love

as the automatic door

of Te Papa slides open

expelling a gust of spent

air my flesh pimples

denouncing my innocence

as i look up at

the slender bones of that great

heroic benefactor of man

THE RITUAL — ONE MORE TIME

i sit alone on the open deck of the Manly

ferry the wind ferocious in its intent

whips my hair and my jacket as regularly

as a gigantic oscillating fan

your genuine AA voice came to me urgently

imploring me to make this trip from my

home hundreds of kilometres away by train

and ferry

how my mood disintegrates with the change

from land to sea a ritual of mind in which i need

to see the sky above me

you would understand

the fear of being enclosed for you had freedom

taken from you a darkness which expels

the air from lungs as surely as water does

only two other passengers huddle inside

the cabin on this off peak run (off peak) it makes

me smile the ocean peaks and peaks again as

wind is relentless in its message

i shouldn’t have come i should have turned

back on myself as the waves do

the ferry docks

there was no

one to meet me at Central Station no one

at the wharf no one anywhere as i struggle

upstairs to a small sparsely furnished flat

the promised key under the doormat is a

promise which ends there

you wake me when you come in

aggressively demanding from me that

which i cannot give

aboard the morning ferry for the return

trip the sun brightly drops through calm

water sparkling on garbage floating just

below the surface plastic bags

billowing as undulating jelly fish tinnies

jostling for some mysterious position

in the harbour as you have done in my

ordered life

all day waiting on Central Station my

anger grows i board the train early anxious

to leave this city this relationship this man

one more time

DUCK DINNERS

from fluffy yellow ducklings they became smooth white domestic ducks large birds beautiful and friendly

we fed them bread in the yard at the back of the house patted them picked them up and held them a while and when they became adult we relocated them to the dam

they loved the water quacking and flapping in delight happily making it their new home

we kept in contact cast bread upon the water for them chatted and patted them sometimes until that dreadful day when the largest drakes walked right into my husband’s plan enticing them home and one by one killing them for their meat

such slaughter was flagrant the stench of blood and hot wet feathers stayed in my nostrils for days the sight of their sleek white headless bodies hanging from the rotary clothes hoist haunts me still

i cooked their naked empty bodies duck dinners for the family but was unable to eat that fumet meat their adumbral wings still hover over my once peaceful agrestial land

THE INTIMACY OF PLACE

lying awake at night i realize i could never know you as intimately as i know this place when sunlight rolls out from behind rising mist as it climbs from the valley floor early morning mist lifted from rain-soaked earth drawn up by the parching sun’s rays

outside the window sunshine flashes through leaves like christmas tree decorations seen through the eyes of a child

the magpie lark’s strident cry comes shrilly from within a thin outstretched neck on a slender body the lambent flight of a swallow touches its reflection on the clear surface of dam water and is gone in a flash barely detected an updraught produces the ebullient emotion of a tall weed singled out for attention by imperceptible wind

how angry the night wind sounds in its effort to enter through the smallest opening of a window i could never enter your world and you would not wish to share mine with me