Perhaps she said, lively at first but once

too often in hat softly stubborn voice:

‘What kind of a country d’ye call this!’ –or

‘Pity I can’t send for a wee drop of rain

from Home’ –and that would be Ballachulish

on Loch Lynne (for th nine hundredth time).

Here, water is kaki and each day a battle

with mouths. Seven, born quick as roses but grown

slowly insupportable with their throats

and itches and grizzles. Two farmed out

(a shame that) and one in a home,

returned maybe for Christmas and Easter

a frightfully quiet stranger. They kept,

just, the four little girls.

                                    Would that be enough?

Rain at last, too much; the spuds

to be got in, tractor on the blink, more

work than feasible for one man with fear

waiting in unopened bills and no rest.

No rest ever from her soft worrying tongue

and that ultimate gnawed bone, no rest within

except in the grog (money ill spent) but oh

the beautiful glad spurt of the grog

                                    So that he said

‘Shut your trap woman!’ Astoundingly.

With the rabbiting gun. And she slumped

open-mouthed all over the bed and then

the four of them, easy! Sleeping easy

in their bright blood and the bloody dog

                                    and the excitement

of no fear for the crowning achievement

Him Self…

Source:

Barnes, J. & McFarland, B. (Ed.) (1986) Cross-Country, A Book of Australian Verse. Richmond, VIC: Heinemann Education Australia.