|
poem | Carol Jenkins
KULIN SEASONS
This poem is for the Kulin people, in the cold Yarra Valley, who found these seven seasons of place and for others who have found seven marketing events, and with thanks to Museum Victoria’s Forest Exhibit.
Buath Garr, the pobble bonk calls,
its voice a falling stone
in the moist twilight that wraps
long grass round your legs
Shopping malls pre-emptively bleat carols
you are sent reeling for your plastic &
buy snowmen cards to send to people you
don’t talk to
In Kangaroo-apple season
you can watch small bats
harvesting insects from twilight
Or behold Christmas’s bleakly dancing bear,
eat and drink too much, such fun is
seldom seen
Close on, the Southern Cross is
low and level on the horizon
it’s Biderup, the dry season
the heat in the day hangs on your shoulders
and shade is improbably cooler
We have the summer sales
when clothes are racked and wheeled out to shop fronts
breezy banners announce red hot specials
to match the pouting weather
Luk comes with fat eels swimming
towards Canopus in the east,
the Manna gum is flowering
perfect weather for new lovers
Previews of winter fashions
stumble drunk and prickly hot
into shop windows
now is the time
to buy long pants of wool
Waring, wombat season,
wombats walk as if the inheritors
of the earth, days
are short to suit wombat legs
We are flooded with foiled
compounded chocolate, cheap
yellow chicks and motifs of feral cuteness
as the Expressways boil with Easter drivers
If they only knew that orchid season is coming
and much would be gained
by a careful study of the forest floor
while walking quietly with friends
The winter sales are declared,
all the clothes are now at the right temperature
pity they don’t have your size
We might slip into tadpole season
where days and nights are balanced
the stars are judicious, things go right
Or restock the warrior father’s larder
with power tools and update
to wider viewing screens
But somewhere the grass is flowering again
warm rain is falling and at dusk
Orion stands sentry to the east.
© Carol Jenkins
Overland 185–summer 2006, p.75
|
