A day in the bush

Yesterday I went to the You Yangs with some family members. The You Yangs are the blue hills across the bay which feature in many of my photos. The traditional owners of this country are the Waddarung aboriginal people and the name “You Yang” comes from the Waddarung words Wurdi Youang or Ude Youang which mean “big mountain in the middle of a plain”.

Loaded up with cameras, art supplies and food we set off with my daughter drivingand two boys full of excitment in the back seat of her big vehicle. The older one was prepared for any eventuality and had a backpack full of survival gear including a wooden dagger and some string to make a bow if he needed to get a fire going in an emergency. The younger one who aspires to be an artist when he grows up clutched a sketch book and a freshly sharpened pencil.

Our route took us through a grimy busy city and on through the industrialized suburbs on the outskirts. Once we left the ever expanding housing estates behind it was a short trip up into the hills. Turning into the park we were all silenced by the power of ancient writhing trees and huge granite boulders towering up around the narrow bush tracks.

There were a lot people everywhere as it’s school holidays. We drove around for a while looking for a picnic spot. The heavy rain of the past week had wreaked havoc on the dirt roads and I was really glad we were in my daughter’s big car. My little hatchback wouldn’t have been up to the task.

We finally found a picnic spot that was relatively quiet. There were signs that big bushfire had been through there many years ago. We were surrounded by trees with blackened trunks that had survived the fires and other hollowed dead ones that towered like sentinels.

Wandering around with my camera I was struck with the relationship between the grey gnarled trees and the grey granite boulders.

There is a solemnity to this country and an inspirited quality that speaks of endurance and resilience. There is an ancient feel to the place that is stronger than the impact of the roads, walking trails, biking tracks and rubbish left behind by ignorant people. People have walked this land for eons. The aboriginal presence is strong and the trees feel like embodied spirits.

Later in the day we drove a one way road that took us over the ridgetops and around the far eastern flank of the hills.

The road was in a very bad state so once we were down on the flat my daughter pulled over beside a little water hole. Not many people come this far into the park so we had the place to ourselves.

None of us were in any hurry to head back through that busy city so we got out the art supplies and attempted to draw the world around us. The results were highly variable but we had a lot of fun until the late afternoon chill crept into our bones and it was time to head home.

Back to the mundane
after time in wild country
the heart feels lighter.

linked to – https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/04/april.html

The light these days

The autumn light in town is hard,
Like hammered steel it glints
splintering into laser beams off cars,
highlighting the flatness of life
these days,
these Anthropocene days.

For reasons too numerous to mention
I drive most days now
guzzling gas, adding to the pollution.
Pumping carbon into the atmosphere
my life becomes a farce of itself.
My conscience twists and turns
unable to justify my own actions
but caught,
oh so caught
these days,
these Anthropocene days.

Out of town on country roads
the light glimmers, stretches,
an autumn haze blurs distances
and I long to be free to drive,
somewhere, anywhere away from
these days,
these Anthropocene days.

Most days when I’m driving,
thinking these thoughts,
feeling this ecological grief,
I see eagles
wheeling high above the sun bleached land,
and the roads that just go on and on
but never arrive anywhere I want to be
these days,
these Anthropocene days.

Certainties dismantling
all we once held as true unravelling
these days
these Anthropocene days
yet still the eagle soars.
I hear its message on the wind.
See the big picture.
there’s always somewhere new to go,
somewhere higher,
somewhere lighter.

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/03/the-coming-of-light.html

Childhood

Riding up front next to dad,
his big meaty hands relaxed on the wheel.
No anger in them today.
No hard smacks on bare flesh.
Today’s he’s happy. Jokey.

Where are we going dad?
There and back to see how far it is.
What will we do there dad?
We’ll get a wigwam for a goose’s bridle.

The wide green Ford hums along.
The plump bench seat roomy. Comfy.
In the early morning light we ride the coast road.
The sea stretches beside us as silver as a mirror.
The late summer grasses stand tall,
yellowed and brittle beside the dusty gums,
their mottled trunks as silver as the sea.
In the paddocks the ridge of sheep backs shines,
gold white in the sun.

No matter what happens,
life’s an adventure.

prompt: You are to craft a poem from a child’s perspective about everything a child comes across. See life; see this world through the eyes of a child.
https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/03/children.html

Finding a reason

So many reasons not to go out today.
I’m tired, I’m broke, I’m feeling down.
Then, there’s the sun creeping into my room,
there’s the plaintive cry of the seabirds,
there’s the scent of the sea on the wind.

Down at the shore the tide is low.
Wandering out of time,
I could be five
or fifteen or forty.
but the rocks are slippery and I remember,
I’m old now
– a lifetime lived wandering the fringes,
of the continent,
of society,
here at this time,
– the climate going haywire,
war and mayhem,
species extinction,
environmental degradation,
the rising cost of everything.

Is this the collapse?
The shift?
Will the voices of dissent
finally be heard?
Will justice finally be done
– the controllers overturned,
the tables turned,
the wrongs of ages righted?

Down by sea,
here on my own,
gazing in rockpools,
forgetting the troubles,
the deep, sad weight
of being alive
at this time
on this planet,
I find a reason to go out.
I find a reason to love life.

?

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/03/fifteen-reasons-march-6.html

A new place

My house move done! On a rough count this is around the 60th time I’ve moved in this lifetime. So here I am with the bulk of the stuff unpacked. The current rental crisis has meant I have had to downsize radically. A lot of stuff has gone ‘free to a good home’ or to the local op shops.

Yesterday was around 40 C. The hottest day of our southern summer so far this year. The cool change blew in overnight and the temperature dropped by 20 degrees. Today is overcast and breezy. Spaced out from hard work, heat and nights of broken sleep bought on the emotional drama that preceded my move, I took a break this afternoon and went downtown to the huddle of seaside houses, cafes and shops at the mouth of a wide bay.

Colour harmonies soothe –
layers of soft greys and greens,
a stretch of yellow sand
and gentle white capped waves
rolling in –
a hushing shushing sound
echoing in the wind.

Washing through me,
seaside colours and a rush of salty air
playing with my hair,
billowing my shirt,
There’s a scent of freshness.
With so much old baggage gone
I am lighter, freer.

A new arrival.

[

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/02/colors-passing-through.html

February morning – Australia

Somewhere in between
meditation and breakfast
a cockatoo shrieks

?

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/01/its-wednesday-and-this-is-what-i-know.html

New shoes

I used to have some magic shoes.
I wandered in them wayfaring like,
the Tarot’s Fool, forever leaping,
following the flow.

Covid changed all that. 
Locked down,
fearful and alone,
I discarded my old magic shoes,
shoved them in a cupboard,
let mice nibble through the laces.

Now, with things so constricted,
options limited and hope hard to find,
those old shoes slip right off my feet.
My flights of fancy,
my positive affirmations,
my optimistic thinking
all feel naive, inappropriate.
Playthings from another, simpler time.

Old pathways are blocked.
The bridges back are collapsing
yet,
in their place new openings emerge.
Barely there,
glimpsed in the golden dawn,
crystalline, dancing tracks of light.

Whispering incantations
I cobble shoes that bend and flex,
not so much to go with the flow
but more with magical intention
to find just where the flow is now.

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/01/magic-shoes.html
Imagine a pair of shoes . . .

. . . that could give you or someone else magical powers, 

and weave them into a poem.

Building a bridge

A silvery arc across empty space,
this journey into cronehood
misunderstood,
denigrated and maligned.
Some say the hag is the crone repressed,
patriarchy contorting her experiential wisdom
into a laughing matter –
the little old lady,
past it,
sweet but ineffective,
doddering, slightly senile.

So many women of my generation,
battle scarred and weary
yet refusing to surrender,
rewriting the story,
building bridges back to ancient ways,
throwing off the mantle,
stepping out from under,
daring to be seen,
to be heard
now
in these troubled times
speaking out for justice,
for those who can’t speak for themselves.
For trees, baboons and starfish,
for the oppressed and the fearful
but underneath it all,
and most importantly
speaking up for herself.

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/01/bridges.html

I know I have to go

I know I have to go but how to do it?
Old stories repeating.
The characters have changed,
the energy remains the same.

That same trapped feeling,
the sense of obligation,
the desire to please
or is that –
appease.
Narcissistic people
asking for so much,
too much.

The need to grow beyond,
to rekindle joy,
to follow freedom’s song.

Why should I not be free?

Even now
the same old stories repeating.
The characters changing,
the energy remaining the same.
Suddenly now I see –
karmic bonds become life lessons.
As always, the answer lies within.
It’s I who holds the key.
It’s I who sets me free.

I know I have to go but how to do it?

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/01/parentchild-relationships.html

Sometimes floating

Drifting, sometimes floating,
neither here nor there
just always journeying on.

Some say it’s best not feel,
but to let the rolling years,
carry you forward, on and on,
never stopping to consider
just why you’re here and not there
or if you’re anywhere at all.

Others say you must define it.
How can you get anywhere
if you don’t know
where you want to go?

Drifting,
sometimes floating
always journeying on
to some place I can call home.

A loaded word that
– home –
not a drifter’s word
unless the home
is deep within the self
or even in the drifting,
sometimes floating.

prompt: https://newwhatsgoingon.blogspot.com/2024/01/the-music-of-our-youth.html
A song that led me out my parent’s home and set me on my journey way back when I was young