Posted in Before the Rain

Eulogy

Posted on by tq1695

Rural compression :
people didn’t get married or fall in love
–  “they got together.”
Couples never separated, divorced or were estranged
–  “his Missus shot through.”
Incomes didn’t quadruple with a bonanza season
–  “payout wasn’t bad this year.”
And when the mortgage maze had no apparent exit
and
the rifle became the final solution
–  “things got on top of him.”

“This Friday is it? Hope I find someone like ya,”
my severance and valedictory.
On the last day he was distant – distracted
at 3 p.m. he said that was it for the day,
said he had to get moving –
“so you might as well bugger off too.”

Two hands emerge from the pickup window
one offering a handshake
the other an envelope. And then he was gone.

Envelope contents

  1. Final fortnight’s wages
  2. Holiday pay
  3. Tax certificate
  4. And.

A smaller envelope: ‘ for good work  ’
– inside $50.
I never saw him again.

Part II
It wasn’t the most satisfying job I ever had,
or the highest paying,
or the one where time went the fastest,
or where I learned the most about myself,
or when I was proudest.
But, it was the best. So long Bill.

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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.