769
Hydro Majestic,
Medlow Bath
ii, 2018
the past is this façade
and I stand for it
like the pregnant lady
on the bus
too young to wear a cap
because mum says I
should
a legion paused
ridge hazed to fray
run
half a bath for a suggestion
it's
by way of curtains framed
a
world in strips lit
tracks
dust
behind
those hills more ridge
you're
taken in and stare
clouds
carved day first
white
limbs reach dead
someone
is always been transformed
and
too much of a certain flower
mum
says, though she's no gardener
today
they're blue
it's
distance
and
gum tree in the air
the
track grows over
the
flying fox track to the valley farm
we
scrambled up down teenage that
and
slept in the station waiting room
with
filched coal for the fire
and
roaches tossed to it
should
a passenger come in
the view – the
postcard travelled through
rotation, railway,
skywalk
and devils of Tasmania
made with pipe-cleaners
coloured to suit
all kinds of improvised
fun
and tennis for the
adults too
though I think I
learned here
it's not for the waters
you come back for the
view
know that all this
leads
on for forever
but
not as far as before
I
think it's a fire had the
waters
away
but
one might imagine
very
Arthur Streeton
pre-Hydro
I
don't mean he was here
some secret liaison in
the open air
dad was
before the war
and had a dish named
after him
I can't remember which
but too much of a
certain flower
mum points out, edging
the Three Brothers track
passes by the ruined
pool
fey places, faux
Edwardian
more Darug really, all
this style
and stars bright for
remembrance
as if the world had
turned
as I recall we never
went anywhere
days of full board long
gone now
but everything was here
respectable
years – mr and mrs
it's
hard to see what's near you
corridors
and
the croquet lawn
and
the world's best toilet view
like
remembering a childhood sky
some
kind of silence is natural here
the
cloister upstairs still a morning sauna
east
to the highway
white
gravel gone
weren't
there tall pines all along?
this
castle had a forest
one
native, one was brought
and
there's where I wasn't allowed
pink
lemonade came out
amazing how they've
shrunk the ballroom
shifted the hunting
scenes to the hallway
no walks, no pool, no
hobbyhorse,
no Renee (Ri-ni),
jazzband
no fancy dress, no
Indian get-up
you can't even walk the
clifftops now
that's where the
legends were told
as if Aborigines were
no more
but this bloke talking
looked like one
must have been
sunshine's familiar
and later with
girlfriend, sex on the rocks
and another girlfriend,
after that
as if for old time's
sake
and still all long ago
sheet of cloud facing
as if you're in them up
here
a corporate catch to
keep this on
the
details black and white writ large
failed
deco effort
it
could be a boardroom now
catch myself off
grazing
paddocks away
same certain flower
persisting up here
I won't divulge a
colour
outcrop
poles and wires
rusted like bushranger
big bad banksia
here's a hidden valley
all look
it's just I see
from light this is all
far
but
the smell I can almost
remember
that
is quite quite gone
retro amnesia?
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