Den

Den

Pommy, hey Pommy, d'yer know whadda roudis Pommy?

Black Marie'll show ya for a coupla bob.

Take no notice says Den, they're geein' you up.

Third year. Nowra.Sixty three.

Pimply faced, soft voiced Den, angular, synchronicity jarred,

elbows and knees jerking the bike

like a jackrabbit snapped in a trap.

Smart bugger Den. Fine tuned brain.

Pommy paddles out from the cove sun clings warm

Wead waving slowly clear fresh salt splash

Flush with the swell

plow to the point where rollers rise in symmetry

like prayers in a rosary.

Sarah, hey Sarah, do you run to a cuddle Sarah?

Den's dad Pat, nose red rolls a ciggie winking

You bally old fool she shoots back, behave yourself.

Narrow weatherboard house, aroma of decades,

cracks of defiant endevour puttied and painted

muted now, whispers in slow conversation

of deeds delivered and deeds to come.

Behind the break a balsa board blobs on the

belly of the ocean he marvels at

the scale and joy

how the warm swell of fortune drowns the

dry wraith of the discrete English sitting room.

Pommy, hey Pommy, did ya take a bath in Pommyland?

Find a new script Bowlsey says Den.

Cicada shells cling to trees dead eyes staring,

beware their ghostly song which seeps and snares

into the night.

Den and Pommy walk the pipeline to the dam and back

sharing a snack on soft white river sands.

I was lifted on high by the Hand of God.

The wave sucked all thought memory

desire, nothing but the

will to ride the wall shot to eternity

surge and swing and drop and rise and turn again.

Denny, ask Pommy see if he wants to join us fishin'.

The hut a fortress from bush rat and ranger

Bastard got in but, says Pat. Sinkers and tackle stole.

I'd shoot the thievin' rat. Dinks. Beans tonight, bream tomorrow.

Stepping along a bush track Den jumps back shit so close

Death Adder, kill ya, quick as a shot.

Den avoided the beach, not a swimmer.

I cherished this new world so alive with

chance it rose and dove

in warmth and wave opon wave the sunlit

shimmer of silvery dreams alive so alive alive oh

Den and Pom at the bucket end of Pitt St, all debris,

dust and grime. Some flea bung establishment.

Shangri La. Ha.

Cop breaks in at dawn. What're you two up to?

A Day in the Big Smoke. Eyes like possums. Cop snorts.

Constable Webb. He paddles in filth Den says quietly

Dip your beak in the gutter you paddle in filth.

Slice the face of the wave godlike and blind

momentum in concert with life flow aligned

immortal, sublime

but somehow

tripped some tick Divine and suddenly smote

and plunged
down
through
the
devil
deep
ocean.

I hadn't heard, then Pat sent word that Den was dead. Suicide.

Run in with the cops down in Tasmania. Did the bolt.

Came home somehow concussed. Lost inside himself said Pat.

Wiped out, godless and drowning, down through the

devil dream ocean

deeper than sunlight,
where the song of the cicada is silent,

so far down there was no way up.

A place where sorrow
is washed away.