Posted in Before the Rain

Interregnum

Posted on by tq1695

 

There’s plenty of work down south
hops, tobacco, fruit picking,
but not until late February –
almost 2 months distant.

The employment bureau gave me his number
“Bill,”
tall, broad shouldered, bearded
fencing contractor
looking for a labourer
someone to do some work,
“yakka” he called it.

My pencil physique causes out loud doubts
I tell him I’ve been working on a farm
“good – can you lift that ”
“that,” being a bundle of palings wirestrapped together
I can. And do.
“You’re stronger than you look.”

I tell him I’m only wanting six weeks work,
he tells me he’ll decide that.
“Start on Friday.” Today is Wednesday.
The year is three days old.

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Author:

Most of my life has been spent on the bench, occasionally called into the game by extravagance or attenuation. Waiting has turned a loner into a recorder - nondescript and inconsequential, more not noticed than overlooked - the non-vantage point of children not yet considered old enough to understand. Orphaned Islands (Un)poetry is a lifetime of picking anecdotes up and not throwing them away. Stories collected like odds and ends placed in a box in the basement, the garage, the garden shed - uncertain as to what their use might be but knowing that one day there might be one.