Thursday, January 11, 2018

Rob Schackne #562 - The Bridge On The Way Out Of Seymour

The Bridge On The Way Out Of Seymour


A pram in the water
an old bookcase
a door with one hinge
hard to say

all abandoned
the children grew up
left town years ago
she took her last breath
in the library rest in peace
he shut the door behind him

the bridge on the way out of Seymour
and I just got here

5 comments:

  1. How well those links work! Love it.

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  2. beautifully local and regional yet familiar road trip...

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  3. I remember climbing out of the rain into a car outskirts of Seymour 75 or 76 and it was something flash with a coloured dashboard - like getting into that spaceship in Life of Brian
    -- and then just as suddenly I was back out in the rain, not ever Wangaratta

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    Replies
    1. Ha. Yes. In the early 70s I also spent a lot of time hitchhiking in the area.

      FOR THE TERRITORY

      Lights out for the Territory
      one day (you know it's coming)
      speaking with snakes as he crosses
      the riverbank, and shakes the grass
      and watches how the horizon rolls

      Humps an old pack, wears a GI poncho
      almost water-proof, plastic around the clothes
      a single book that keeps changing its words
      the poetry of the world busy in a storm, cars
      rush past him, sometimes a driver honks

      Direction suggests itself in wind
      the wind is directed by hope, and it
      might have been assisted by love, if it
      had not just started to piss down, if he had not
      just seen a bolt of lightning explode a tree

      After a while he starts laughing hard
      with what will certainly be glee, the gods
      are as wet and cold as he is, while the Territory
      recedes and succeeds till the gray sun rises
      and when he rounds the bend it is waiting.

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