Orphaned Islands (Un)poetry

She wore an air of separateness and something else
a quiet that couldn’t be taught and I had yet to learn.
It was most obvious at morning break
there, amidst assembly-line homogeneity, was difference.

While the others talked of children and trivia
swapping stories of school, shopping and TV heroes
she decoded cryptic clues
rapidly filling in the blank across and downs.

Memory is exact
she was exactly twice my age
34 to 17.
Not a coming of age story but
a departure from grace.

She had been practice manager for a legal firm
a glorified secretary self deprecation claimed
engaged to a junior on the brink of partnership
when
chance encountered – an old high school flame.

The school she attended wasn’t bad
just not distinguished
a convergence zone
of almost middle and not quite working class
her early boyfriends from school, mostly good  – the odd rascal.

This one she remembered even when wise enough to have forgotten
he was in business and needed administrative help
distribution was his line. Stolen alcohol the product.
Things were simple then, no electronics – surveillance or record-keeping
a huge warehouse, stock churned faster than the speed of paper.

The work was light, the pay heavy. She was in.
Things were good for a while. Then a bust.
A prison sentence of four years
seving just over half
remission for good behaviour and first offence.

The moral was not to get greedy she said.
In the early days everyone was known in the first person
then friends of friends, later acquaintances of friends of friends
finally a scruffy pale skeleton, who looked like a junkie
and drove the sorriest old Volkswagen you ever did see.

Except that last day, when he arrived in a large sedan
accompanied by colleagues – the police.
Only got myself to blame she said.
Now nothing remained of the once future or fiancé
there was only the present, assembling electronics.

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Beautiful, not an adjective applied to men
but at that moment he was
auburn hair undiluted by age
eyes microscoped by the large lenses of fashion
wistful and blue distending into the troubled future.

Almost three decades later
I could return to the room and mark
the exact point where carpet and prophecy bisected.
The 1980’s
but still the seventies
cushions on the floor, earthenware goblets.

Crystals stalactite from the ceiling
stirred by children’s high octave laughter
the Red Sea of noise parted
to allow the passage of prediction
brief seconds of sorrow while hyperactivity gathered breath.

The topic of conversation a fellow employee
older than us
but not by the margin self deprecation claimed.
Some people will not die from old age
my friend solemnly pronounced
sobriety draped black over us.

Seventeen years later the same room
in a different home
one divided by the absolute symmetry of divorce.
My first return to the town where pain began
a visit which has healing as its intention
but only deepens the bleeding.
Names from the past punctuate the evening meal
our former colleague?
Died. Ten. No, eleven years ago.

How old? Not yet fifty. I recall our discussion
at another place
in another time
and the prediction that was statement.
Blue eyes contract behind contemporary frames
and distil fractions of past. He has no recollection.

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Dave Scott
instantly identifiable.
In a room full of strangers
anybody could have picked him out.
He looked exactly the combination of his two names
accessible and sensible.
The sort who probably cut a few classes
just enough to know about the other side
to be sympathetic and wary of the devil.
The first training placement
he mentor and marker.
Welcome he said, meaning it.

There was something winsomely outdated about him
clothing
handwriting
slang
almost everything
even coffee break. He drank tea
from a conical cup
rim twice the diameter of base
with a saucer
slow thoughtful slurps
thinking about lessons finished … and to come.

I remember that cup forever
yellow and old-fashioned
it paused with perfect symmetry
exactly half way from table to mouth
rigid with attention – a witness.
The staffroom swarmed around us
bundles of photocopying
collected assignments
deans with punishment lists.
In the desperate way people look for survivors
I had asked the question.

Expectation and hope.
Hope expected a well intentioned lie
expectation hoped time be proposed as solution.
Teaching really couldn’t be taught he said
“Its largely innate, either someone can . . . or can’t”
after 27 years of trainees he just knew
said anybody of similar experience would.
“it’s not for everybody
I don’t think it is for you.”

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