The blackbird watches me
from the plum tree.
My daily ritual and bluster of housework.
The blackbird cocks its head,
adjusts for a better view,
shiny eyes searching for
cat biscuits, chicken food.
I want this blackbird as my friend.
Hop down without fear,
feed from my hand,
like it once did.
But I tried to touch.
I
from the plum tree.
My daily ritual and bluster of housework.
The blackbird cocks its head,
adjusts for a better view,
shiny eyes searching for
cat biscuits, chicken food.
I want this blackbird as my friend.
Hop down without fear,
feed from my hand,
like it once did.
But I tried to touch.
I
broke the trust.
Now the blackbird watches me
from a safe distance.
Now the blackbird watches me
from a safe distance.
Grandma's Lap.
When we were on a car trip with Grandma and Grandad, Grandad would always drive; he was good at it.
He used to be a racing driver, 1st at Silverstone in 1957.
He had to give up and missed it.
He had lost part of his foot when the engine of the E-type Jaguar he was racing exploded.
He hobbled around with an insert to pad out his shoe and used a walking stick a lot.
But in the driver's seat, nothing had changed; his response to the road was marvellous.
Dad would sit next to him, the son and heir. Proud and trying to live up to the expectations of his father.
It is hard to live up to war hero, captain of industry, and racing driver, Mr McMillan, sir, at the factory in Stalybridge.
Dad would sit stiffly in the passenger seat, trying not to say too much.
I would be in the comfortable back seat of the latest new car, with Grandma.
And she would, with uncharacteristic sentiment and gentleness, lie my head in her lap, and tell me stories.
I would look up at her adoringly, which she liked, and idly play with the lovely necklace she wore.
A long gold link chain, and at the end, it had a gold bauble, shaped like a hazelnut, with a little clock set in its base.
Sometimes she would let me wind it, carefully, with my rough country kid fingers.
The stories were always of Horace and Doris, who were hobgoblins who lived in the local wood.
The plots mainly consisted of domestic duties and minor troubles with neighbours.
What was lacking in literary device was made up for in my mind.
I closed my eyes, snuggled in at her maternal bosom, sniffed up her expensive scent, and let myself relax.
Every time we took a drive, to Alton Park or Chatsworth, the destination was irrelevant.
It was all about the story.
"Please, Grandma, tell me more about Horace and Doris."
"Oh, Eliza, I don't know if they have any more adventures."
But they always did.
And so I would settle into the life of the backseat.
That time I got trapped in an elevator.
We are at the Natural History Museum of Vienna. Dad and I aren't getting on.
I am stroppy, and some local boys start following me around.
I try to evade them by a quick floor change via the lift.
Phew, in. Push the button for the ground floor.
The lift moves down a couple of centimetres, then stops.
What have I done? Why does this always happen to me?
How long have I been in here? Will Dad leave without me?
The closeness intensifies my fear in this windowless space.
I start to panic.
I hear voices outside the doors. Has someone realised?
The next thing I know, a pry bar came through the door, wielded by an enormous security guard.
He opens enough of a gap for me to climb out.
Then, to be reassuring, he pats me on the head and, in a Terminator Arnie voice, says,
"It's alright, little girl".
The humour of the gesture breaks through my shock.
I see the boys who are following me laughing at the situation.
But full of newfound strength, I stride past them to the stairs.
I rush to find my father, who is impatiently waiting for me at the entrance.
"Where have you been?!"
Frank and Aubrey:
Up on Fern Flat overlooking Motueka Valley, trespassing pig hunters would sneak around, occasionally getting sprung by one of the grumbling old landowners, Frank and Aubrey.
Down in the valley, the bush gave way to pastures and agriculture. The brothers ran the oast house for tobacco drying. Tobacco was a crop that grew well on the silty flood plain under the warm sun, something the Motueka region was known for.
The brothers were brown and furrowed like the land they worked. I would stare at the rough hands of these rough men who didn't bother with the niceties of life, but they were always kind to me.
Dad said when he visited them once, the external wall of their bathroom had collapsed, but that didn't mean it was going to be fixed in a hurry. Dad found out by talking to Aubrey, who casually said Frank was in the tub, just getting on with it.
Frank and Aubrey exemplified stoic 1950s sheep farmers, with few words, but somehow seemingly philosophical in their silence.
These farming bachelor brothers rented their old converted sheepshearing shed to my hippie parents. It was an almost allegorical setting: the former animal shed where I was born.
