Barry Smith: RUSTED HOLDEN

Yesterday we happened upon a couple of young aborigines. They were pleased with the big blue prawn they’d caught at the nearby waterhole. They smiled. Unsullied by age or the influence of modern living their teeth were beautiful. We smiled back.

From our vantage point today we can feel it. We can hear it too, the silence of sixty thousand years. As far as the eye can reach the altar cloth of earth spreads out into a haze of eucalypt and smoke. Apart from the fires of lightning man the landscape is barely changed.

Behind us are their galleries. On the walls are layers of ochred art, most of it within reach and under the sandstone overhang. There are human figures and animals, even a Thylocene. Many appear to relate stories, probably dreamtime stories. Some appear in inaccessible, even impossible places. We wonder if these are derived from a different epoch or are they created a scaffold of bush poles? At our feet are the pocks of their palettes. These are conical ochre grinding holes, each as deep as its age. Their pestles are nowhere to be seen, all probably souvenired and gracing someone’s museum or lounge room.

At the back of “Big Bill’s” nearby cave is the deep litter of ages; bones, ashes and charcoal, and flints. On the wall Bill has stencilled his hand and has drawn, in ochre, the outlines of a pearling lugger; even put a name on the boat. Someone has drawn a line in the dust to indicate a future archaeological dig. In the topmost layer we see the sawn bones and bottle tops. At the foot of the slope …

half buried in the sand
two burnt out hulks rust
a Ford, and a Holden.

by Barry L Smith
Hamilton, New Zealand

Barry Smith: PHOEBETRIA

After a night of fear with the anchor dragging and yawing to and fro across Cairnley Harbour we break away and are now entering a little inlet. We can see the bottom but are determined to get as far into the inlet and away from the wind as we can. Hooker’s sea lions circle us, diving down, looking at the narrowing gap between our keel and the seabed. Each time they come to the surface wide-eyed. We joke that they are trying to warn us. They are.

low tide
tea towels hang still
forty five degrees

After the drama we need a break on the island.

We struggle all morning up through the tough scrub of this sub-Antarctic island. About midday we emerge torn and weary onto the tundra of the upper island. It is soggy but progress is better as we traverse a swampy flatland towards the ridge. The freedom from scrub is exhilarating and we rejoice in the keen breeze. Once on the ridge we gain height to a vantage point and rest. Below, our yacht nestles in the bay. We now know it is in the capable hands of the resident sea lions. To the north of the ridge sleek sooty albatrosses soar and dive. We marvel at their aerobatics.

A little beyond our point we notice four of them on the ground. They are the light-mantled sooty albatross and they are gamming, that ritual gathering of mating and bonding. They call, preen and posture. Each bird has a crescent-moon, white, about it eyes. It is an amazing display, only rivalled by the beautiful high stepping dance of brolgas.

The two of us creep forward, making sure not to infringe their five metre personal space. We have entered paradise. They know we are there but choose to ignore us. The wind lifts the soft feathers of their plumage revealing the most sublime magenta colours—and it lifts tears from our lower eyelids. And it carries off their haunting call.

one albatross
steps forward
invites us to dance.

by Barry L Smith
Hamilton, New Zealand

Barry Smith: COUNTING SHEEP

The hut has a backdrop of beech with an aspect to the mountains. You sigh as your shoulders slide from the pack straps. The sun mirrors off the snowfields above and you turn closed eyes to its warmth. It is a remote hut with little chance of visitors and the beech forest has a handy supply of standing deadwood, easily broken into hearth-sized logs. You gather enough and remove your boots in the last of the afternoon sun. High cirrus fills the sky as the billy simmers. The stew is good. Warm in your sleeping bag you watch shadows fight on the wall as the last log lights up. It rains and makes a gentle sound on the tin roof. Later, you’ll wake to hear the rain easing.
.

morning sky
a beam of sunlight

birdsong

by Barry L Smith
Hamilton, New Zealand