Intruders
Australia
Designed to zing, this dappled paradise
accepts the climbing sun, as boots crunch
into virgin silence, where eucalypts
on jigsaw-puzzled trunks infuse the air.
Cicada rhythms rise to grate the day,
a clumsy parrot raids the banksia flowers
and unseen birds disturb the canopy.
Spikes and fronds, coarse grass and spindly climbers
compete in umpteen shades of green, and stumps
licked black by greedy, fiery tongues stand naked
in the lushness. The unfamiliar
becomes familiar, until — stand still —
shapes rustle close as kangaroos emerge
then swiftly disappear to shadowed depths.
But, when the kookaburras come, in cackling
gangs so mock with almost human cries, like
crazy laughter from a lock-up where
the poor, mad souls exist, they seem to shout
“Get out, go home,” and so the strangers turn,
reluctant in retreat, leaving the Bush
in vibrant mood to sizzle in the heat.
Page(s) 4
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The