The Golden Gate

Sometimes I remember
The extent of my privilege
To cross a bridge
From here to somewhere

Other

Unfettered
Without risk
Without consequence
Without desperation

Somewhere better
To be
Somewhere different
To see

The Road to Somewhere Else

There is a road
Which goes
From here
To somewhere

Between
There seems
An expanse
Of nothingness

A place to come
Only to move on
To make plans
Buy provisions

A beach head
A landing
A portal
A gateway

The desert
Is simply
A ten thousand year
Drought

We are subtle lovers
The rain and I

I suppose that is the way
Of rainforest life

I hanker for the sun
Complain about the wet

But it exhausts me
when the sun stays too long

Every picture tells a story
Don’t it?
I suppose.
But I know better

Every picture evokes a story
Evokes a feeling
Evokes a memory
Or an insight
Or a knowledge

I watched the white paint shrivel and dry
On the old shed out back

I watched it pucker and peel
In successive seasons
Of wet, then cold, then wet again, then heat
Since decades past

On a perfect powder day
And the sun breaking through
On the untracked line
You’ve been eyeing for months

The last thing on your mind
Is an avalanche
But it shouldn’t be

In a land rife
With enigma and anomaly
Emu and Uluru
Kangaroo and Kata Tjuta

Tnorala rises
From a wide, flat plain
Dug out by a shooting star
Which fell to earth

Were there no eyes to see
Would there still be
A universe to see

If the bumblebee
Could do science
What world would its textbooks see