Selected poems
Drought
It was summer in the midst of drought.
The earth was parched, impenetrably hard,
and all about leaves fell like rain,
clogging gutters and the drains.
Leaves fell in clouds, curled and dry,
and formed a carpet across the street
that crunched beneath pedestrians’ feet
and whenever hot breathed winds eddied by,
blowing veined fragments into the sky,
they blinded eyes like winter sleet.
It was only then, I realised, we were
watching trees trying to survive —
desperately shedding leaves to stay alive.
The great divide
In the eastern, beach-side suburbs,
inner urban culture thrives.
At café tables by the curbs,
latte lovers graze on words.
Sipping chai martinis through
soggy cardboard eco-straws
they can be overheard
discussing important first world concerns
or comparing the performance
of the cars they drive;
the art house movie’s perceived flaws;
the dearth of public parking spaces or
providing a precis of The Feminine.
Sharing make-up preserving
air kisses — and the same prejudices —
they are happy provided they are seen.
While, west of the Great Divide,
where skeletal cattle chew dirt for cud,
farmers shoot breeding herds and studs
and worry how they will survive.
My neighbour
My neighbour feeds the magpies.
He thinks he is being kind
but, to the result, he is blind.
Warbling to greet the dawn,
the magpies queue from first light
and, rising late, he doesn't see
the birds are a blight — that while
he sleeps, the magpies strut
about on stalk-like legs,
and prey upon, peck and devour,
the rare and pretty blue wrens' eggs.
Blowfly
A sound of summer in September:
the buzzing of a solitary, early, blow-fly;
stopping over there, starting again but,
now, nearer here, brings back memories
of lazy pre-pubescent Saturday afternoons
in a dusty country town and of nasally sung tunes;
of the drone of continuous racing calls,
drifting on visibly shimmering, heat haze;
of corpse-carrying fly-paper, hanging
in spirals from moulded ceilings —
akin to raison-sized genes stuck on a helix;
of coloured plastic tapes or strung-beads
suspended from lintels to hinder their entry;
of meat-safes that preceded refrigeration;
of hardships that helped create a resilient nation.
Jeremy Gadd has published four volumes of poetry, two volumes of short stories and had plays professionally performed. His recent novel, The Suicide Season, is available from Stormbird Press (Adelaide). He lives and writes in a Federation era house overlooking Botany Bay.