Alan Wearne

for Robin Rattray-Wood
Gentle, inaffluent,
susceptible to portions of pity though
a mild cynicism increased
as he left high school and
The High School Student's Union
(articulates in berets with
little yellow stars: ‘Semantics, man . . .'
‘Aww that's a cop-out, man . . .):
susceptible to cool, correct sympathy
(slight commitment)
any girl concerned to teach him
wines, driving, boredom.

And Nicol, she was joining NIDA yet
they kept company for a few weeks
of a dry summer (shifts and
blouses flapping over the line).
What's she like to live with?
Ahh that's romance, attainable
as clap. All construction:
a partner in sorrow would be
wonderful: poor pet, poor pet. (Such
prey we are to prey!)

Windows of dwarfs, in Xmas
the city was presentiments, expenditure,
recalling for him an earlier attempt
(each day begins a year)
‘How often should I see you?'
and the mother with hands smeared
in drycleaning fluid. Nice
nice nice nice. He shivered
for their kingdom of constraint,
but no quibbles, virginity is
amazing, beautiful as the back
of Sarah's waist,
how neat it was!

‘See a show?'
‘You're hosting!'
Then
lets.
Mrs Salmons (was it Salmons?) suspected
at least casinos: ‘Where will tea
be?' hinting at liquor ‘Eh?'
Why it's toast, Ma'm, it's an evangelical
coffee house, Ma'm. Shook hands.
Coming back her father beaming Young Ones!
and Sarah asked ‘Excuse me?'
left for sleep. That body:
small, neat, redoubtable, it
seemed unfair; but quit the thought.
We were a debacle!

This year, Nicol. On weekends,
before her course,
they trotted round the palm tree parks,
up to rotundas, her home at hand
through lime-white colonnades, there,
a lot for him:
table manners, the correct liquor. Some
minor heiress in a cheesecloth blouse
sustaining his dictum:
‘My word, Marxism is exotic!'

For last year (as a friend referred)
Les Chinois stoic in Bakeries, their cache
of humorless invective; yet oh the design!

Living is divergence, plus
‘how swell'. A trainee life-assessor and
Sarah would be very very happy. Not hers
some fuming dialectician
(their High School Student's Union pronouncing
such ministry ‘Lethal as a nail gun').
Some years further
here's he, sitting in a bandstand,
the NIDA trainee saying ‘Sometimes
I can't conceive of letting a man near,
you understand?'
Romance is, you know,
danger; though a few nights
before her parents drove Nicki
over to the flight she took him
eating. (‘Daddy's a solicitor
with conscience.') Workingmen mean
a lot and the waiter asked him him
regards wine, ‘Sir?'

Damn brief, ought to have been
forgettable (I'm forgettable too) kissing
this forthcoming actress, oh poised for
an unsorrowing wave off the tarmac:
the outsized sunglasses, the smart,
pudding-basin bum, cheesecloth.

A lift? Please.
On his prize bush, aphis. Nicol's father
stated aphis and how to end it
(talking of steps to Mr. Potter, gardener).
Yes, a lift . . . with music to town
and you in my arms . . . easy, adult, radio
smarmed away its ‘Happy day happy day.'
...

Always in training. Yet helping with his work
was partly boring, sometimes even nasty.
Still, even when I felt he'd gone too far,
think Here we go again out came the logic
smooth as a circle, Roman disciplined.
Brilliant. Yes. Yet never near to God.
Only when he ran.
Only when I saw him striding.
(He'd leap and throw his arms above his head.)
It really was a case of Run with me.
I did. And often we came down the mountains
(jogging loosely, never with a cramp)
my running partner, heading for Jerusalem,
appeared as if his feet were next to God.
This too was a feat: running for a month
(as rumour had it).
Sprinting in the temple
was nothing less than perfect. Tables knocked,
whips raised and money lost.
He charged them twice.
Of course revenge was needed, and his arms
were raised once more; his feet, however, broken;
sort of enforced retirement. Still,
he made a comeback to end all comebacks.
Once
there were ten, and I half-walking, pacing
(my room-mates, seated, limbered-up in thought).
We stopped the noise and movement; standing still,
I heard the footsteps pounding up the stairs.
...

Sarah . . . of us in our chaise the photograph
shows Colin and I turning a bend towards The Ferns;
will send it soon. Introduced, fussed-over, we still laugh
as ‘newly weds'. The other guests - one's a baronet - take turns
as mama and papa: ‘You babes so young . . .' (Often
it felt unlikely I was married.) After luncheon Mr. McCracken took
us out in the motor. ‘Where to Mrs?' he asked. When
that made feelings quite important this ‘high toned lady' (me) looked
out over the mountains: miles of fern-gully, waterfall,
and ‘To the prettiest place you know!' I replied.
If raining we never read, but pretend it's a log-cabin, all-
for-us.
Yet, from the verandah, we saw this stupid boy who shied
a bird from a tree. I slipped hand into my husband's watching
the wilful child tread the damp lawn, slingshot aimed and smiling.
...

(i)

how, after those months, we met again (remember?).
I called, must have been mad around August confessing my trivia,
conferring delight you asked if I was nervous,
‘No!' why should I be even dried the dishes
as we listened to the radio how, not much later
I heard that Otis Redding had been killed,
(wouldn't have known him if Crazy Wayman hadn't squeezed on those tracks)
I said - what's he trying to prove - yet
there it was for all our debates Al, Otis rhyming
,proving everything on Michigan's bed 'course
A Modern Death Befits A Modern Man as
blessed and doomed, all the Russias ground on through the Holy Frozen Water,
not having you, any of you to retreat, to respect,
they have I suppose died either modern, or frozen


(ii) Otis Redding

(and) at the same time, unaware they were playing you into the lake
(and) glory! the industry had to leave you die Otis,
wouldn't have known who you were, if squeezing
the stations hadn't sponsored the tribute tracks, saying:
I searched, and was found blazing for glories I was glad to go out of:
(In Ending,) Otis one opus of quizzed admiration; who wants
the screaming crossed soul by crotch, (Michigan Music)?
you gave and how, I little know,
tribute in a bitter, man kind of love.
Redding, Redding, remorse will smash any epilogue chance,
any sweat-liturgy you sang and I might have attempted
once I walked in the rain until one once
to shout O, 'tis (forever!) Redding;
but in this my poem, it is only one of others


(iii)

So, to you it concerns itself yes
what I could have said was
:as to murmur ‘Madness!' was (my Toorak Road!) madness,
though we loved through the lovers
at any rate let's dabble with our lip-on-lips
even with the Russians and Otis buried out stanzas back
and hope (old, cheesy grin - but it was mine,)
that none of us have laboured any inconceivable horrors
that is perfectly understood and unsatisfied I said
nothing I said - we used to have goodnight prayers at ‘club'-
a walk (run!) ‘round th' block its your time you're wasting thank you god for everything
I said, I and by now you have become just trivia, a fault
mine exclusively mine but
after seeing any of you again, the fault will start and how? how
...

The speaker was a courier for the Mr. Asia Drug Syndicate.
I'd get in from the airport after midnight
and wait a day, till someone came around,
unloaded me and made me Thanks sweetheart
$15,000 richer. Then I'd hardly be noticed,
not till Allison called, or Kay, and we went off to buy
all these incredible clothes.
I knew of two apartments, ours and theirs;
theirs, a place where you went in,
(saw The Organisation dropping by to pack the stuff)
and you went out.
What did I think I was,
not old enough to break the law? What law?
By then the only law I had to keep
was getting away with knowing Terry Clark,
so yes I was old enough. I did it,
did it often enough; and whoever I was
I just needed an identity, even if
I didn't need an identity. I was smart and
waiting about on the fringes of Terry Clark's
banal life, hardly knew what I did,
except that I was that damn special.
Giving myself a week away from spending
I caught a light aircraft back to the folks,
stayed up to near midnight
doing gossip with Mum. Of course
someone's kid was ‘into drugs',
always someone's kid and always drugs.
And I thought
Who knows what The Organisation's doing
right now: cutting, grinding and packing;
delivering, collecting and waiting
and how I never wanted to feel damn special again.
But Thanks a lot sweetheart of course I did.
...

Hear the way élitists snigger
over our latest Little Digger;

well funny how there's nothing said
when I address our living dead,

nor softest heckling intrudes
upon their mate's beatitudes.

(Yet how can I . . . let's clear some phlegm . . .
show I feel like one of them?

And how to find which words to choose
for ‘Fellas, I'm near one of youse'?)

Oh that my final battler breath
was breathed beside the AIF.

When little tops a patriot
line up lads, let's see us shot!

Darwin to Cooktown via Geelong
my heart tells me where I belong:

hear it pounding beaut beaut beaut,
soundbites and a photoshoot.

Go slam shut each trendy gob,
I'll take my orders from the mob.

Ahh democratic treasure trove,
let's jet home to Anzac Cove!
...