Tug Dumbly - Les Murray Through a Glass Bottom

Les Murray Through a Glass Bottom

Les looks down

through a glass-bottom

at the fishes and the weed,

at the reef that knifed the Sirius.

A big man in a tiny boat.

Only about six of us.

This much I remember, though

most of the time I was gilled

on duty-free gin.

I barely recall my readings

on Norfolk Island.

That’s another poetry festival

not to have me back again.

I get a flash of me and Gini

running into Les and his wife

outside a convict ruin on the green,

of Valerie being lovely

and Les expanding free

on the place’s history.

We find Dorothy Porter,

alone and under the pines,

high above Anson Bay.

It’s evening, and she so small,

dark eyed and self-contained,

far from anyone and anywhere.

She smiles. She gone too.

But what sticks most is Les,

too big in that boat too small,

peering down through the glass

into a clear green fathom,

and me thinking Prospero, 

what’s he seeing down there? 

No, what’s he really seeing?