Wide Earth

The smell of the juniper bush, the gin
And rum mixing on the night air
Carried on a breeze that makes the hair on my neck
Prickle.  Every heartbeat pulse that sounds on a dark night
Echoes through ears hidden by hair that holds
A heritage.  A quiet so deep you can hear the long gone
Chants, the shuffle of soft leather over sand, the roar
Of the fire, the keening of women.

The stars are spilled salt across a black velvet sky
Hung like ropes from the four corners of the Universe.
With the Earth so wide I sometimes forget the parcel
I'm on, packaged away like an old childhood toy,
Whispered about like the factory mingles with the clouds
Churning out its own fabricated tomahawks and headdresses
Against the backdrop of growth and industry.

I peel the sweat-soaked shirt from my body like
I peel the curled tobacco leaves one from the other,
Remembering my birth comes from the sweat of a thousand men,
Of forgotten ritual, of names signed to thousands of pieces of paper
To be tucked away for centuries
Tenor voices urge me from within to find comfort in the heat of battle,
In the warmth of blood, the humidity of neglect
While the moon, lidless and stark winks at me from its

corner of the sky

In commiseration.

(c)Kindra McDonald

published in Skipping Stones 2007