peace-weaver.

I really want my thoughts and prayers to tend so much more naturally towards loving God and people. Not just genuinely caring, not just thinking of them, but lingering there easily, effortlessly. To run in circles around God's heart for people and His own goodness, rather than returning home in thought to the things I need His strength for.

To learn where His desire for us to surrender to Him more is still surrounded by His real delight in us.

and it's sweet to've come.

As a father has compassion on his children,
so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him;
for he knows how we are formed,
he remembers that we are dust.
The life of mortals is like grass,
they flourish like a flower of the field;
the wind blows over it and it is gone,
and its place remembers it no more.
But from everlasting to everlasting
the LORD’s love is with those who fear him,
and his righteousness with their children’s children—
with those who keep his covenant
and remember to obey his precepts.

The LORD has established his throne in heaven,
and his kingdom rules over all.

you search me.

When I was woven at first
in the depths of the earth,
you sought me there; you knew
all the days hidden for me
and whether they'd see light.

If I now so uncertain, so small, flee back
into the darkness to be born,
if my mind flies through the earth
and the depths I saw,
you are still with me.

I love the light of your face.
We walk with open hearts, with you in eye.
Kindness is truly my companion.
Everything rains blessing here in you
on this road, which is yours only always.

So if I rise on the first light's wings
or if they chase me, meet me
on the other side of night and seas,
your words are as close as my own and my love,
to obey them; your strong hand guides me.

out of the depths.

We see so far into everything and
we are so small.

See the poet who writes Nature,
Beauty transcending.
Is he true to his vision at evening?
Who commends himself to Heaven’s harvest?

Or you whose eyes responsibly fail in your darkness,
whose pen leaps out of hunger into chaos:
hold it to the end then, if still you can,
for the sky's epitaph.

I can’t, I can’t; love unrequited.
Write of open fields,
of deserts
and mountains who fall to goodness
with strong songs;
kingdoms and hope everlasting,
trust beyond strength
and the worship
of those who are small
and so blessed.
These songs are older,
born of the wind.

The world itself will flee
until we shelter in the words that still remain.

the end of a breath.

We run with more trust to the words
that are always on your lips,
in this your love!
The feet of the noble are like those who come
to the home of a friend, invited.
They'll wait without dread
and trust with praise for kindness.
They'll wait for just a moment.

We are like the rain
sent on the earth,
touching the surface of these moments
and seeping, creeping into them.
The future is real in your eyes only;
there are dreams that are empty
and things that are too wonderful for me.

Our eyes find the substance of your love
in its place, as those who stand on a mountain
and search, and breathe, the sky itself;
those who know that you withhold
nothing.

Why does grace pursue me?
I can't grasp for goodness
yet your love is always with me.

You who wake me from my dreams
and your loved ones from death,
your light is like the morning.
Your joy awakes our light vastly, deeply
over all these salted waters.
They surge and rage
even among hope,
but we are holding peace.

(to the tune of) a dove on distant oaks.

"Then my enemies will turn back
when I call for help.
By this I will know that God is for me.

"In God, whose word I praise,
in the LORD, whose word I praise—
in God I trust and am not afraid.
What can man do to me?

"I am under vows to you, my God;
I will present my thank offerings to you.
For you have delivered me from death
and my feet from stumbling,
that I may walk before God
in the light of life."

to love what is yours.

The gentleness of others, the softness of the afternoon
and their faithful joy in this deep light,
the rain of last night,

they call me to wear something new,
something simple,
unnoticed
apart from the incomparable loveliness;
your own goodness.

Something simple, more pure.
Let quality protect herself, then.
She'll surprise us as we finally arrive,
unhindered
by persuasions that bring praise
on ourselves instead;

freely praise.
Everything woven into the new garment
that is your own love.

She responds through the ages to you
in a glory of delight,
and within her I feel it;
I come to you (and yours) more aware
of the flood of your hope for us
worked by your own hands,
here.

Simpler too, I hope,
looking at your beauty,
since all these days are born
to such a humble light.

gibi.

"Then you will call, and the LORD will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

"If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.
The LORD will guide you always;
he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring whose waters never fail.
Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins
and will raise up the age-old foundations;
you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,
Restorer of Streets with Dwellings."

to seek for.

Distant, small-lit skies
who glance at morning,
stirring all together.

Light ornate
but I've slept till now;
a little longer.

You touch these branches,
alighting like fire.
I reply with stillness now
under wakeful sunlight.

the sparrow's crown.

Under the heat of exile, sparrows hop
between the fallen branches and long grass
chirrupping.

Where are the summer feasts,
music droning lavish to the glimmer of wine?
They are too far to hear
and hold no allure in the field.

If the roses at the gate, still strong at midday,
threaten to wilt,
pay no attention.
The garland that blooms when they will be buried
by the grass and wind
will rise gently in the mist
tomorrow morning;

will not fade as the light rises.
This is the pilgrimage of soil
and it's worth the wait.

all existence.

Doubt and awe might thrive
together. Swiftly growing,

green in the earth
all wrestling
for bright daylight.
Stories limp profoundly
as they wade, towards
becoming new.

who bends with the remover.

Come, sit in the shade of this tree
whose branches reach
out through the sky;

come drink the sunlight
when spring fills the lakes
by the hillside,
creeks, the salt-oceans
and undammed rivers,
leaping dim and bright.

Know our eternity,
filled by the waves of infinity.
Might all impregnable.

Come.
Dark in the hour after midnight,
remember revolution.
We were for freedom,
oppressor to fall.

Hatred and dread,
the heartbeat of Paris
that pounded our aching as strong
as her cities and ancient woods:

blood seeped out
into cobblestones,
dark under moonless night.
We were revolution.

Then a gentler fortress,
Conscience besieged
within truth and grace.
Royalty I fear,
his palace I abhorred,
my siege I set.

Terror in the air,
death in the black spot
of flesh,

tear it;
scratch or cut it, bleeding, if you must
in the name of spring.
In the shadow of the dream of life.

Over the cobblestones,
who trod silently,
determined,
soul of the stars
who soar eagerly?
Crystalline light.

Purity whose life fills up all life;
the blow severe
that tore my insurrection.
Doubt and tears that drenched all the rivers
are rushed into forgetfulness by a new army,
love.

Love who holds the light
upon winter and spring;
sunlight and starlight,
the waking and dreaming
of which you still breathe
every morning:

deep within memory
is the hot spark of flight.
Circling around it,
you spin here
at the edge of all life.

to the bee we walked by in the park.

Small honey bee:
From you I have no fear
this gold and windswept day,
content on your flower.

Yours would be the death
held in your sting,
for me but momentary.
May you live long.

Dying in defence, the instinct
that allowed your birth;
or else another kind of love.
The precious sun that shines:

Yours is the sweetness
you take and give back.
Happy to wander, from
flower to flower.

116.

love is not love
Which alters when it alteration findes,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no, it is an ever fixed marke
That lookes on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandring barke,
Whose worths unknowne, although his higth be taken.

the first breath.

If there were royal blood
anywhere existent in the world;
if it were sweeping your heart,
your hands,
the crown of your head,

and not of yourself
but by descent,
a gift both kind and noble—

would the air you breathe be different,
the bird song or the early sun
in waiting celebration?

Make way in your moments
for new ways to enter
among us.

inscribed upon.

We are scattered people.
Careful relations of
mother, of uncle,
of father of fathers,
blown to the wind
by a cultural tractor plough.
Now the nameless wandering
over red dust.

It still gives birth
and the trees still grow.

We are treasures carried off,
piled together, heading to the north
among spoils from all shores.
Voices bound but not alloyed.
You the historian—
say what you will
about the people we remember.

There are names engraved
in stories you can hardly
recognise;
let us then be claimed.
Brought to life

glimmering,
response to fire.

to be alive.

Never could I fall from this reach,
fade from your light
or turn from this mercy that enamoured me!

Still my eyes gaze low,
tired or perplexed.
Still my mind turns dull:
to wait without running,
call without hoping,
desire without chasing,
try without feeling,

until you remind me
of love.
Love is pure in love, and even
half a shade below its light
is rot, the endless night
of faces turned.

You are enough
if I yearn for you,
more than enough.
Your love is truest
in a chance for love like this,
life like love.

you have loved.

In the mornings your love sings.
In the cold we need your face.
In our weakness you are close, beautiful.
On the mountain your heart calls, resounds.
In the fortress you are our song.
In our sorrow you have loved, deeply.

Your glory is the word that reigns.
Your fire stands like a solid rock
that will never break.

You are our desire
and all that our thirst waits for.
You are faithful hope
and all that we live here for.
By your mercy we are yours,
our God.

You have come nearby to us:
held and formed us by your light,
raised us from the earth and spoken here.
As our lives leap bright you dance with us.
In our dying you are poured out.
In our summer you are strong, shining.

I will awaken.

Tonight a water mains burst in our front yard. It threw water twenty metres high for an hour or so. So wasteful and waiting, so long, for someone to turn the water off in our street... Yet awesome. Some of my family hurried for showers.

There's a flash for this photo; the real thing was monochrome dark, cold, huge and loud. The moon and streetlights caught glimmers in a heavy outbreaking of water as high as the gum-trees, where you had to look right up when beneath.

hear it.

In love with the mythical,
we found the mystical.
As we remember,
particulars of culture
have always filled

our words regarding
largeness.

Under the heavens,
catch this world
in vapour webs.
Matter and form are all song,
silver notes buried
in the depths of bass;

else, we befriend the solid souls
of rivers, of dense hills
swollen under our feet,
the breeze
that sweeps over them both,
glistening in autumn.

Trees will clap their hands.
Lift your hearts up
for a great choir:
rich with soil, echoing
voices that all bow
near the roads to that mountain.

Though myths feast under crowns
of bright surrender
at this table,
there is one note,
one love,
a single friendship,

that we must never empty
into many.

men at forty.

Men at forty
Learn to close softly
The doors of rooms they will not be
Coming back to.

At rest on a stair landing,
They feel it moving
Beneath them now like the deck of a ship,
Though the swell is gentle.

And deep in mirrors
They rediscover
The face of the boy as he practices tying
His father's tie there in secret,

And the face of that father,
Still warm with the mystery of lather.
They are more fathers than sons themselves now.
Something is filling them, something

That is like the twilight sound
Of the crickets, immense,
Filling the woods at the foot of the slope
Behind their mortgaged houses.

(by Donald Justice)

evening by the lake.

It's but three years
since we sat 'round
those yellow desks, mosaic’d
in Pollock’s genius.
All precise, that tangle
of moment and fire
split and spilt—
memory sent
to its burrows
as staple-guns war.

(When will he rise
on the white-primed sea?)

Hand guides mine, with the brush
in mine. As I paint lately,
my hand is that hand.
Children of aether, or children of earth...
There is developer
all through my clothes.

We have witnessed Memory.

Autobiographical persistence
wanes away.
Understand these hundreds of layers
of worthier strokes,

lost in someone else’s worlds;
images dart in and out
of these feast-hall windows,
warbling.

and we'd rejoice.

The Best Of It
Kay Ryan

However carved up
or pared down we get,
we keep on making
the best of it as though
it doesn't matter that
our acre's down to
a square foot. As
though our garden
could be one bean
and we'd rejoice if
it flourishes, as
though one bean
could nourish us.

which cannot be measured.

"Better a little with righteousness than much gain with injustice." "Honest scales and balances are from the Lord; all the weights in the bag are of his making."
Proverbs 16:8 & 11

riddling.

Nis min sele swige, ne ic sylfa hlud
ymb dryhtsele; unc dryhten scop
siþ ætsomne. Ic eom swiftra þonne he,
þragum strengra, he þreohtigra.
Hwilum ic me reste; he sceal rinnan forð.
Ic him in wunige a þenden ic lifge;
gif wit unc gedælað, me bið deað witod.

My house is not silent, nor I myself loud
about the splendid-hall. The lord shaped us two
to venture together. I am swifter than he,
at times stronger, and he more enduring.
Sometimes I rest myself; he must run forth.
I dwell in him ever while I may live;
if we two are parted from each other, death is appointed for me.



It's lovely :) The typed OE text is from Mitchell & Robinson.

car trip.

This afternoon I wrote my first proper short story since high school :) I like it, so I'm sharing it! My English Curriculum teacher has explained that we shouldn't ask students to do anything we can't do ourselves, and that we also must bring to the classroom a personal culture of reading and writing if we hope to develop one in our kids.

So, enjoy: it's quite stream of imaginative consciousness, and all in fun. The first part is the stimulus we had to use, written by Mal Peet. (I didn't match the style, though I did try to use a children's literature voice.)

***
That summer, we drove up to the cabin in the hills. My parents liked to ‘get away from it all’. What they meant by ‘all’ was stuff my brother couldn’t do without, like broadband and TV and pizza delivery.
On the fourth day we went ‘exploring’. It wasn’t exactly a Burke and Wills type project, seeing as how we had four-wheel drive, satnav, a map, mobile phones and an Esky the size of a coffin. Plus a whingey twelve year old with his head wired to an iPod.
After an hour or so Dad said “Let’s give this a whirl”, and turned off the road on to a downward-winding dirt track. Eventually it levelled out and we found ourselves in a valley. It was hotter down there. Mum cranked the air-con up. The track ran alongside a dry creek; off among the scrub I glimpsed sag-roofed buildings and the ribs of old fences.
“What is this place?”
“Dunno”, Mum said. “There’s nothing on the map.”
And then we came to a stretch of crooked, bleached-white fence, and standing behind it was a horse with a boy on its back. They were completely motionless, even though flies clouded the horse’s head. The boy had hair like black snakes, and wore only a frayed pair of cut-offs. We were past them in a second. I looked back, but they were lost in our dust. No one said anything, which I thought was kind of weird.
I dozed off, I don’t know for how long. I woke up when the Toyota lurched and the first thing I saw was the same rickety fence and the boy on the horse. His dark eyes met mine as we passed.
“Are we lost?” I said. “We’re going round in circles.”
“No, we’re not”, Mum said.
“Yes we are”, I said. “We passed that kid on the horse a while ago.”
Dad squinted at me in the mirror. “What kid?”
Mum turned and looked at me. “What horse?” she said.

I looked at Mum’s face for a moment, and when I saw how serious she was, I turned to the window to stare out at the wild, dry landscape. It didn’t make sense—but in this surreal, unfamiliar place, I think that affected me in a different way to how it might have at home. Everything was slower, as if Mystery were a character who belonged here just as much as I did. Mum and Dad were right: there was no one there. Not only the horse and the dark boy were missing, but as far as I could see behind us, there was also no fence.

“Um. I was only joking.” Of course I didn’t want to explain. Dad was always going on about the rational approach, and how superstitious, sentimental types create dreams out of nothing and try to make others live their lives accordingly. If I were going mad, I didn’t want to argue it with him—as if the horse boy were something I’d chosen, or wanted to see. But I was absolutely sure, clear as anything else.

“No you weren’t!” Daniel replied loudly, not even taking off his headphones. “You were serious!”

“Was not.” I couldn’t think of anyone in the world more annoying. I wished he’d stayed at home, like he’d wanted to. I wished he played on his awful computer all day, instead of ruining the whole trip. “As if you know what I’m thinking!”

Before he could answer, Mum turned around again, and Dad pulled over to the side of the road. “‘Bout time for morning tea”, he said, and everyone agreed. Dad was good at that—cheering people up, making Daniel stop fighting. I didn’t like the conversation anyway, so I bit my tongue and let it all slide.

I was confused. Who was the dark boy? Why would he disappear? Why would I see him? I knew people could see things when they went crazy, especially old people on medicine—like my great-auntie Melissa who used to talk about feeding the cats who weren’t really in the room at all. Mum said she knew they weren’t real, but that it was hard for her, because she could still really see them. I guess you have to believe what you see.

Maybe he was real. Looking out at the dried grass, and the wide, wide sky and horizons, I could almost certainly believe in ghosts. They sort of made sense here. This whole place felt strange and unknown: felt just like ghosts. What if he were some dead child from an unknown past, in the empty houses near the creek—and now haunting us? Why? I tried to tell myself it was ridiculous.

Clicking my seatbelt back on, I slammed the door closed. Mum handed me my apple juice in the yellow plastic picnic cup. “Don’t spill it in the car!” Dad said. “Be enough trouble just cleaning the outside.” He was smiling, and I could tell he didn’t mind. It wasn’t often that we got to go on a holiday like this. I decided to try to enjoy it as much as I could; after all, I was fifteen, and not immature and boring like Daniel.

Even though the satnav said we weren’t lost at all, the track seemed long. It was all repetitive. Nothing really changed. The same sort of trees, the same grass and sheep, sometimes cows. A little while further, more cows, and the sun staying high and hot in the sky. I put my pillow next to the window and leaned my head against it.

I think I must have started dreaming, then, but it felt real. Everything felt just exactly the same, as if the world had gone into my mind without changing at all. The dried out grass, the broken down fences, the same hills rising to both sides of us near ponds; all the sheep, and tall eucalypts spotted over the landscape. Just when we’d passed a paddock with a few cows further in the distance, the car stopped, so I opened the door.

When I got out, I saw the boy. He was galloping towards us on the road, still a long way off, but coming fast. My heart leaped. He was chasing us. I wanted to know who he was—but I knew that I couldn’t meet him. I started to run.

I ran, with the galloping sound growing louder, louder behind me. The fences were all still the same, repeated over and over on a long dirt track that I couldn’t see the end of. The sun was very warm: so bright and eerily red, in the dusty sky. The horse boy had almost caught up to me. I could hardly breathe: my legs were like lead, but I was running as fast as a greyhound. He passed me.

I stopped still, breathed hard with relief. He mustn’t have seen me. The curious figure sped away to the darkening sky—still glowing, but it looked heavy, as if it might storm—and I knew that I needed to chase him. To find out who he was, and why he was following us. Everything was dark by now. All the grass was replaced by a deep orange dust that glowed under the moon, the flashes of lightning and the bright Milky Way, peering through wherever the clouds parted. Large drops of water hit the ground, and my skin; I started to run again.

It must have been at this point that I realised I was dreaming. The boy on the horse was out of sight, but there were others running with me. Jenny from school, and the twins from down the road, and a whole hoard of animals on foot and birds flying—calling out, screeching and shouting as we went. Even though it felt completely mad, all moving so fast, it felt like we ran for a very long time. Somehow I forgot I was dreaming, and realised how much I was enjoying the chase: if it weren’t for that nagging, lingering wonder, dark inside me like the night. Who was he? Where was he?

I knew where he was: he’d gone into the bush. I sped to the front of the group, past the dingoes at the front, and turned off the track onto the fine sand, soaking under my bare feet. “Into the bush! He’s in the bush!”

They all called after: “In the bush!” Their voices a cacophony, under the sweet, white light of the sky and its opening clouds, growing louder and louder as we ran through the wet trees and leaves to a clearing. It looked like a billabong (I’d never seen one before, so I wasn’t sure), wide and stagnant under the light of the full moon. Everything was silent, and I was alone again.

There were definitely ghosts here. I threw stones over the water, making them bounce, skip, then splash, down into the murkiness at the bottom.

I jumped in to swim, hoping there was nothing there lurking, watching me in the depths. It seemed that there might probably be, but I loved the squishy mud under my feet. I loved the sweet, warm air that filled my senses when I closed my eyes, letting it sweep around my wet face. Good thing I’d practised my swimming in Mitchell and Daisy’s new pool. Hundreds of fish wandered around me; I opened my eyes to find that they were leading me, in a long, trailing school, towards the other side. A shadow stood dim beside an immensely tall tree.

I reached the bank, and everything was darker. The moon must have gone behind thick clouds: only the stars were left. A voice whispered to me, and I knew that this must be the beginning of my adventure. “Lily?”

“Yes”, I replied. It was very solemn, all serious and grown-up. I sat down next to the person, who wasn’t nearly so tall as I’d thought. He was a platypus, with sleek, deep brown fur. I didn’t want to seem too high: he was very old, I thought, and held too much authority and wisdom.

“It’s so good to meet you”, he whispered again, with a sort of richness; he really meant it, I knew. “I can tell you this: that the horse boy would very much like to meet you, and is waiting for you at the Great Mountain.”

“I haven’t seen a mountain,” I replied—and then realised I shouldn’t have spoken so loudly. “Where is it?” I added softly. “Where did everyone go?”

“I don’t know much”, he said gravely. “Not even the wombat knows, and I must confess I’m only a messenger. But if you go back into the lake at midnight, and follow the moon on the surface, you will certainly find out.” He nodded slightly—kindly—and then darted away into the water.

The sun began to glow against the horizon, almost immediately; then, there was only one bright star left, cold in the grey sky. All sorts of birds were singing, and the kookaburra was cheery, joyful as anything, up in the early morning gum tree that seemed to reach to the ceiling of the world. I supposed there was nothing to do but wait for the day to pass—so I sat down, to watch it begin.

The blush of the heavens in the east was beautiful enough to look at for hours. Even for Daniel, I thought. I wondered where he was, and realised that he must have run off with the others.

About half an hour later, a sound caught my ear. A puppy came swimming to me on the lake, and came out panting, smiling, wanting to play. She looked like Felicity, the brown and white dog we used to have at our other house—the house with the really big back-yard, and the ice cream truck that came every single week. She was smaller, younger, though. I patted her wet head, and laughed as she ran off yapping, pretending to howl at the newly born sun.

We set off running again, all refreshed from the night’s swim; we welcomed the brightening morning, while all the birds were still singing with full lungs and happy hearts. The dog wound her path into a field full of soft, dry grass, which was not nearly so prickly to run through as it looked to be.

To our right, in the north, were piles of great red rocks, as if giants’ children had piled them all up for a game. I couldn’t see the sky beyond them, except through a few gaps in the structure. Their origins were impossible to guess at. They looked like something a clever animal might make for a shelter, or maybe a sort of landmark left as a sign by some ancient race whose great footprints were long covered over, and eroded. At the same time I noticed that there was a strange, almost inaudible singing, coming out from the bushland behind us.

When the puppy suddenly stopped ahead, her wagging tail moved the grass so that I could see where she was. She’d stopped by another pile of stones, almost only pebbles: this time only ten of them, just sitting there together on the ground. I wanted to know what they meant, much more than I wanted to understand the boulders. This miniature mountain belonged not to some distant time, with only its remnants in the present, but to someone still alive. Someone close. Someone, or something, who still had things to say. It was all very strange, exciting, under the jubilant sun perched once again as high as it had been while we were driving. Even brighter and much clearer, now, I thought.

The breeze came strong from the opal blue sky. The singing grew louder, and I could hear clap-sticks.

All at once the bushland was in flames, growing quickly higher, and all full of smoke, threatening to crawl into the grass where I was standing. The puppy barked softly, and scampered off too quickly for me to see where she’d gone to. From behind me came a boy, a few years younger than I—and he wasn’t concerned about the fire. His skin was streaked in white earthy paint, and he was pointing at the pile of stones.

“D’you want to know what they are?”

“Shouldn’t we run?”

“It won’t catch us. It’s a safe fire. We make them so the bush grows, and the seeds fall open, and everything comes back to life: like the morning of the trees and the earth.”

“Wow.” We stood and watched the scene for at least five minutes, those lapping red flames in a wall that ran on and on through the bushland, but didn’t come near us; only grew taller, brighter, over the sky. “What do they mean?” I’d remembered the rocks, thirsty with curiosity.

“I don’t know what they mean. Just what they are.” I’d never thought there was a difference: I hadn’t really thought about it at all. “I put them there to say to the big rocks, ‘You belong to me, just as much as you belong to the great men who heaved you into the earth, in the time outside the time.’”

“Why?”

“Because they’re here.”

“Why’d you want to say that?”

“Yesterday, I asked Auntie if the rocks could think or hear. She said they could understand the earth and the hearts of people, whether they belong to the sky, or flee from it into the caves.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I put them here this morning, when I came into the grass. But we have to go up to the mountain now.”

I knew he meant the Great Mountain, and my heart jumped inside.

There was nothing else to say. So with the bright heat of the fire and the shining depth of the ocean of sky bearing in on us, we started to run once again. We ran until we reached one of the giants’ mounds. “This isn’t the mountain”, he said quietly, looking up high to the top. “But I’ve always wanted to climb it.”

“Are we allowed?”

“When we walk at the top, you will tip-toe.”

We climbed up. It was easier than we thought, because the stones were uneven, and there were places to clasp onto, to put our feet. We felt strong in the smoky afternoon, under the wheeling of thousands of birds over the grasslands. We explored the dark hollows inside, where the sunlight crept through in strange columns; then we wound our way up to the top, watched the sun set, the stars coming out one by one. They were gliding slowly over the sky, precisely where the birds had been before. There were rivers on the ground in the far distance, shining and winding like earthworms that wriggle when you dig them up and hold them on your hands.

Night fell quickly. As the glow from the fire died down into ashes, the terrain took on a blanket of surreal black shadows, each merging into the inky flow of the others, and softly reflecting the lights held high up in the sky.

“You’d better go down with the birds”, the boy spoke into the silence, after a while. “You’ve got to reach the waters.” I’d half forgotten about the mountain quest, and about that riding horse boy.

“Will you stay here?”

“Only till morning.” We sat for some time longer, and then he hollered an unfamiliar call: singing out and out, so that a frightful, flapping shape appeared in front of us, landing on one of the giants’ rocks. “It’s safe. Worry about some things, but never the birds.”

“O.k.” I looked at him to make sure, and then jumped half a metre down. I landed on the warm and feathery back. The boy smiled large, and waved. I snuggled into the plumage, each feather larger than myself, and held on as we plunged and soared far, far under all the constellations. There were also two planets out. I flew over all the landscape I’d seen while it was still day. When it was time to come down, I slid down the great tail feathers, into the layer of sweet-smelling gum leaves that littered the earth in the clearing. There was the water, and there on its surface lay the moon. There also was the platypus.

It all seemed very familiar; the night that had passed came back to me, like a gentle flood. “Are you ready?” The platypus seemed happy to speak more loudly, now. His voice was funny, hardly human, but really endearing in some sort of way; I could tell what he was saying without any trouble.

“You’re coming?”

“If you like. I have nothing to do tonight, and I might say I fancy a bit of a swim.” I was pleased. Instead of a cold, mysterious journey, I would take the adventure with a friend. We both waded in, and I was surprised at how well he could keep up with me.

It wasn’t long at all until we reached the reflection of the moon. We treaded water there, all the white light rippling around us. The platypus seemed to be deep in thought, and then decided—“Keep swimming on, I think, till we find your mountain”. There was nothing else for it. We swam on, my loose hair wet and cold about my face, and came to a place that changed to be as narrow as a creek. It was deeper than anything I could get to the bottom of. We swam on and on, through the same trees, and the same darkness, as if that night were all that ever had existed on the earth. As if the morning, and the boy, and the afternoon, the light and the fire, all fell back into the dream—like a clearing mist—and gave way to the truth of darkness. I knew that like all nights, it had to come soon again to morning; but while we swam on, there was nothing but the silvery light on black water.

The dawn came slowly, and this time silently. The sun brought his face up through the distant leaves, and we saw that we had nearly reached the end of the stream. We began to clamber onto the slippery rocks, and then out onto the bank.

“We ought to follow the fence, then”, my small friend then suggested. There, deeper into the scrub and trees, was the white, half-rotten fence, leading into the invisible distance. He had to be right. “You’ll have to carry me, if it’s not too much trouble. Not too good on my feet these days, you see.”

“Of course.”

We followed the fence all morning. As time went on, I began to hear voices, and everything was muddled. Mum’s voice. What was it? I began to wake up, my eyes still closed, with the sun on my face and arms. I was glad we’d had to put on sunscreen: the light was sharp, as well as hot.

“Just try to enjoy it, o.k.?” Dad sounded frustrated, but still excited. Nothing was to be taken seriously on a holiday, and I loved it.

“So boring!” Daniel fumed. “I hate this trip, stupid cows and stupid fence, there’s, like—nothing here.”

“Not really,” I murmured, half to myself.

“That’s enough.” Mum hated fights. “We’re not going back yet”.

Dad opened his window to let the hot breeze come streaming into the cold air inside. We came soon to the end of the long fence, and he steered the car off the track, onto even rougher terrain.

This adventure was going to be good.

emptied. (rest.)

That was the year
when we crossed the salt-water:
cold on my ankles
and sand wet underfoot
I wandered in.
Walked tentatively
and then plunged,

went with feet so heavy
from the desert that
I stayed on the sea-bed,
for years, holding my breath
and almost bursting
from the sound.

All the sound
under the water.

When it was time, I opened
my eyes, and you opened
the waters.

Exhaled,
dazed,
all fragmented.

Survey the wild walls
blown high
over one’s head—
not so far from
where I first began.

Wander here with me,
on the ocean of dark rocks
and a fate that calls you,
leads you ever deeper
into the mouth
of night
in a conquered terrain. Else,
come. Hold the hand
of one who protects you,
leads you by quiet waters.

See. I will follow the moon,
just once

as she wanes,
and surely waxes; I will hide
in the soil, and then
grow back. Emptied
of seasons and cycles
except for your own.

I am travelling with the birds,
simplified. Clarified
that the marriage was all wrong,
that at this time of year I belong
to another, made
at one
with another.

I’ll breathe and fly away.
I'll wake before the birds
of lovers’ morning.

I will give myself away
to the autumn light,

if you’ll take my life
and make it
yours,
then I will be yours.

rustling.

Do the birds speak?
They’ve told me of your augury,
and I have mentioned prophecy;
there is no overlap

between such songs.
Voice of the sky’s vast life,
clear, bright and true,
or puppetry,
ventriloquy,
your tomes of magic rhetoric
devised. Fables
and lies, set to
music.

Dreams and shadows
breathlessly divide.
Asleep, I woke to Maytime
ringing with the tinkling
murmur, singing
to the coloured glass
of glory and desire,
poetry;
crowds of choir perched
cheerfully near my room,
enamoured
in the morning fire
of autumn worlds
beneath the world.

Such enjoyment.
Dreams, like vapour, often
swim away.

Gulls
on the snowy sea,
in sleet
and fleeting gold
of older days;

that April steals
our maiden queens to
truer, brighter fields.
Are they winding themselves
into circles?

Binding themselves
to the ring gold of fever,
ruby-deep, their fate’s delight
and ruin,
swan-bright.

Wheeling, the eagle
of sight, in this dream,
pierced the crowd of swans
in the clamour and night;
water and flight,
death all confused!

So it was
among my sleep.
"Do not trust them,
flitting wings
of everything
and of nothing
at once."

Here is all we feel
and love,
awoken into naught.
Mountains carried
wailing cries
from the heavens,
and wrinkled eyes of stars
wept for an age gone by.

Birds collapsed mid-flight
and fell,
fell to the ground,

broken
yet alive.
Bind them, wind them
in waking,

find an essence
fallen true.

Earth and sky are telling
the rumours and movements
of what is inside.
Eagerly they fly
the road of heights,
of rising
from all that collides.

The dream is fled!
There are no markers
except for delight;
watch them. You will need
no magic. Listen
faithfully:

two on wing
fly often by, in
such a song, each one
pressed near her brother.

Stars are soaring bright
in the inky low tide
of dissolving silence.

walking, early morning.

Sleepily lingering,
piles of soft snow—
I'd thought them all melted
until I walked further,
where trees were whiteblanketed
up to my ankles

(though not anymore to my knees).
In my heart the ice lay wet,
bright in the sun.
I walked deeper in
through the quiet and birds.

Cold is blamed for death,
for our eternal springtime buried, stained
by waves of blacknight soil.
Silent stars bear songs
of distant months a world away.

Still, that Winter showed her face to me,
much sweeter than I’d heard;
daylight blushed with joy
of dripping, lightened branches,
softly brushed by the quiet and birds.

of the woods.

We couldn't climb that wall,
so lofty its stones. All of us scrambled
a few steps up, jumped
hard—down to the grass,
in clapping and cheers.

I was the highest, that year.
Standing on shoulders, we'd reach
to the top, no one daring
climb or jump from there.

When we saw their branches,
saw those woods,
craning our necks to the flight
of birds with nests on high,
oh!

We longed to explore—

shadow paths, sun setting
on dark leaves, wet against your clothes.
Stories we were told
of chases, songs
and the tip-toe beasts
we could catch, if we circled them
(quietly, quick),

till sometimes in our sleep
we'd hear those songs.
Often gathered near the wall
in daylight afternoon,
we'd speak of the quest
to be Climber and Champion.

Wearing time now, stubborn erosion.
Walking on stilts
and long light shadows,
all the walls are gone.

There were boats with wings,
swallowed in the sky's heart,
meeting on roads without markers.
Only the past can trace them
when the future laughs.

Towers and glare, traffic and wear
might have found me,
except for those days.

(xo)

Qualité
(-Nothing left)

You made a fire in the room,
which ravished the ceiling
and took down the walls.

You could have opened the curtains
and riven the sky, come close
to the hills that watch over me golden;

I would have thanked you.
You of the unbending flame,
autumn hue searing.

Unblinking eyes,
the sun shines
and the world turns.
Cold, the fires that tell
that day is surely somewhere,
but not here;
you are the beauty
my heart has escaped,
but not now.

The curtains were stuck, and I tugged
until silence filled the room,
distant face that beckons. I can’t follow
roads made clear
for broken feet.

Fierce the words come
over my body; deep these ocean beds,
and dark (the fish have moons for eyes).
He who formed the waters
is with me.

words without names.

Everything close is indistinct,
all that is held seems stolen—
once was a gift, brilliant and true,
but the throne feels far away.

Where are the ones
who can hear and remember,
even who see but a little?
Where is he who moves among the garden?

There is a path we believe in,
but grapple to find
not imagine. Ache to love,
and search to please.

Quiet, still and listen
to the voice who stands outside you.
Still, until the silence bends
into the sky, seen emptiness,

and promise that cannot be broken.

the wanderer.

Two went out, to find
a field. Rough it ought to be,
with brambles, tangled weeds,
and rocks of a perfect size
to protect their endeavour.

Eager expectation
greets the great undoing.
Fierce, renewing,
sun on his back—
he who sifts through rubble.
He who imagines his hands
like a carver of stone,
and surrenders to fire.

Hours glide softly
over earth, with such simplicity.
Listen! From your
humble heart ring
rhythms, blessed fealty.
Tired with age, the joy
of gold at dawn,
for those who watch.
Softly ringing,
May the earth
break always heavily.

I have songs as well,
but they are different.
We still seek for fields, yet softer;
we are freer. Oft-times we have wandered,
slumbered, ‘til the evenings fell
and bled together.

Still, the emptiness. Please,
take this away from me—
all these barren words,
like plunging oceans, knotted vines
untamed.

Bare feet stung
and scratched, from
wildness, endless treading
here. Heat from which I hide.
Thoughts that break against
the stones, and I
can hardly lift them
after all this time;

one anointed whisper
falls, unfailing.
Catches my ear,
gently.

Wander here with me, on
unfamiliar shoulders.

Hold the life of buried hearts. Wander
here, with me.

the breaking.

In the Silence many have
heard deep melodies, eternity.
Permeate intangibly;
try to slip beneath
its sleeping current.

Reach the ceiling.
I am small;
nothing, nothing more.
Loyal silence sings, still swiftly.
Wait, to common ear!
Sweetly fallen,
here.

but their own.

You appear,
we speak for a while.
Where is your heart?
Will you join us?

Dark black soil
to stain your skin.
Idea held the knife
to your mind

and spoke, enters;
such absence.

If I wander here,
I trample your soul.

Let me tell you softly
what I heard
that hour,
close.
Closer than I
can hold.
Kindness
fell softly through
my fingertips,
softly through
my soul,
like memory
or water.

Heart unweaves
in words that tremble.
Fragments, silk that falls,

and I hold in my hands.
How can I,
such hands?

Too far;
this peak too high
to breach;
oh, how can I speak.

Crush my heart. Please,
take my life, and
give me away.

a small handful.

I'm posting these together: early this month, I decided to only write forty-words-or-less poems for the rest of the year. I need to become more succint, and recently had read some beautiful lyrics, yet so short and clear, written by a friend.

9th November
something bright.

When the bulb decayed,
its roots all withering;
when rain upon rain
spoke to terracotta,
cold with age—
how could I replace
or discard it?

There will be new flowers,
planted in old pots.
Springtime will watch.


12th November
silhouettes.

Shadows spilt
long, through darkborn
morning; gentle gold beyond.
High-hung, bright hot sun
another hour.

Time collapses into time,
like love.

Silhouettes mark moments
still as hope, stir
under mystery rising:
pieces like a puzzle,
like the sky.


15th November
remembered.

We’ll creep inside,
and feel too small

for beauty so strong.
Words can’t clasp the sound,

or colours the size.
It feels like something given.


19th November
enough.

I swim in many rivers,
quietly.

Over the way
is the deep, where
one day
they all will run together,
wearing salt.

Often I wander there,
among the ancient ocean.


19th November
a brighter lamp.

Apart from the things we said,
and try to forget—just
listen. Stop the clock,

unwind or bind
its hands
(for now).

Hear the sound still
falling, unmeasured
by such movement;

let us enter
silently.
We’d rather just prove you.


27th November
reclaimed.

How long will you stare at light
that appeared too late,
or mourn for what was held,
remade, before you were born?

There is nothing in you
that love hasn't answered for.
Everywhere you've been,
still he lingers.

the wearied melodist.

Recognise the tapestry,
proud against the wall.
Some of the stories are mine,
echoed bright in felt, in old books, paint
on tall museum walls: arching trees
all woven near my roads.

Great parade, they march so long.
All these strands: my home,
these faces like my own, music rich
and threads all dyed to fill
a circling sky.

Faded and unwoven pages,
under earth and time.
Do you know your names?
Buried shouts unheard,
once loud; linger. Here
I stay so long, near silent strangers,
names and homes that I
have never known.


We can hear the first sound.
It runs across plains to find the sea,
and we sleep within its borders.
Three streams flow among us,
but the fourth is lost
to we who have not learnt
to drink, retrace our steps.

Giants wandered there. Secrets all lay open,
as if nothing else had been—
held in simpler words than songs,
for your lives were long.
Rhyme soon born to sounds all new;
we born next, to new arms, all astray
beneath the sun. There were cities then.
Little we conceive, if hardly we can see.

Now we only breathe, and then forget,
like so many lines torn out.
No wedge in my songs is sharp enough
to pierce and fill your fame.
Such ordinary days, so far away.


Grace for his soul,
and honey for his throne:
we walk far from the trees and read
those marvels, tales of younger days.
Here is the bird who built a nest in
branches bound by iron and stone.
Empty words, our fear, acclaim;
battles waged, and burdens laid,
so long ordained.

Those we find incongruous,
or words of years and wars of kings;
my shelf holds room for more.
Where were the homes and towns,
dust now, once filled with the bustle
of hours? Who are you there,
standing in the farthest field?

Miniature world, my tower of years.
Blood as quick as mine, and I
could walk beside you,
hold my arms out wide.


Typewriter clanged with the letters of you.
In the house I read them, lake of
faceless gaze; and all these streets
you rode, the things you thought
and words you spoke, particular.
I pour myself through cavities
all charred, so I turn my eyes.

Whose were the arms
so immediate, warm, when you fell
that night? Even then a stranger.
Eyes that knew an older world
than mine or yours,
and words I can’t translate.
In that moment, not alone,
the cold floor.

Where was he born? Silent days
where he found the words
I softly learn to sing.


This is the cloak I now wear and receive.
Fingers, wind these threads
among your own.

Wait for the time
when hidden things untangle,
all that was scattered reclaimed.
Weave in me
the secret lives and scenes
that only you can read.

after the flood.

It felt like fire,
and I—ringing like metal,
caving all inside to resonate with
you.

Open the door. Step onto
carpeted boards of an old house,
dusty like another age, and
open the curtains to let in the sun,
cooler sky.

Rest for a while, patchwork quilt.
Sewn by hands you can’t
remember, here under sunlight.
Gentle silence. Hold those days again
a moment; bring them near
among the rustling leaves,
glistening outside like waves.

Noise, magnificent scraping, always.
Burst, collide with tensions. Endless,
true, and glare that sears so close.

Only the softest word, one note is full.
It did remain,
we were standing there.

Face turned high, ocean of ink above and
far, far, bleeding infinity,
boundless space, cold stone
walls torn long ago by
endlessness between.
Even darkness filled,
split with saturation by
this home inside.

Sitting again on a grassy hill
outside in the afternoon;
no one sees, a moment.
Wandered further on. I’ll linger,
run to catch them later.

Looking back on where we’ve come,
your heart is like a furnace
as we walk inside.
You’re brighter than ever
and I am inside.

I’ll stay forever.

come (live inside).

Like one blind,
my home is the invisible;
I was born there.
Held, but hardly to feel
the touch, that moment
where I melt into the presence
of another, of love, ever
I melt, but I am held
by the intangible.

Water, parched and drawn
without words by its call,
sun, I shiver in winter:
down, pour it down, light and fire,
know me and hold,
hold me.

I can only hear.
All these long days
since the start, waiting for
that moment—opening up
of a small door, door I can touch
and press my hand against
till it opens,
and a light, dim, golden,
seen, and I,
held—but it’s true,
I have heard.

In my mind I’ll sing that song
around and around,
wait, whisper its words to the night,
and listen to the night
that surrounds,
so close, sing them back
to me.

a show of sentiment (perhaps inappropriate) for the waning of the last full moon.

This one I wrote for a friend. Parts are a little like the last one I posted here, simply because at the moment I'm working on (very nearly finished!) another piece, which has my head in a particular spot poetically; but I think it's nice. I meant it, anyway :)

*

All asleep; I wake, I walk,
to find you.
Servant of desire and wanderers,
forgetfulness; you pour
the icy sea
into my hands

(that cup, that momentary—)
and I drink, I spill
or thirst, and watch those
tides so silent, small,
and sleep. Forgetfulness,
desire.

Tell me how you sing!
How endlessly
you chase that road of
never to hold,

thrown in flight,
deep lake Desire;
sing the words, sweet call
we heard of old,
the ringing sound
that hides my mind,
delight.

Or feel your brilliance fade
this night,
dissolve and plunge,
climb and tumble over
all you know. The call,
that silent song

to lift your head, then wane;
that wave on wave
unending;

chase, embrace the road
(your dearest loved).
Then meet in adoration. Sing
your silent song
unending.

Swift you roam,
and I rest here beneath your glow.

Eagerness, come burn,
spill brightness so much deeper
than your own.

the memory of something.

She smiled at us from there,
till we remembered a place
we had never been;
I walked across the park,
thought there was something more
I'd forgotten to ask.

After we made the fire,
we heard the shadow sounds
and we looked into the sky.
When we arrived home late
we heard the laughter
and joy, and a broken heart
made whole.

created.

Words all lose their faces,
lose their sound and place in time that falls
across the first and silent word,
which comes inside.

Comes, small, speaking sounds that linger
till we come outside.

So we enter; yet also we linger,
made like small worlds, as was the first one.
Small, yet filled with equal measure
till that measure fills the whole.

and the sky severs us, its soul imbued.

I've been home now for almost a week in the unbelievably green part of the world that is Sydney (is that a strange thing to say?), and things are becoming almost normal again. This post has taken a while to get to because this week has been full and at times hard for me, firstly being dramatically unwell with airsickness that lasted intensely even a few days after I landed, and secondly being (more enjoyably) engaged with the first week of uni for this year. It's looking to be a good semester! My compulsary Education subject looks okay, and my three elective subjects seem wonderful :) I can't wait to get into it all; in so many ways it has just been really good to be home.

I haven't written yet about our six days in Germany: it was so hurried, yet still so good! It is amazing there in the winter, and with all the time we spent driving through snow, fog, the trees, the gorgeous little distant towns and hills and forests, it made the travel worthwhile. When we first got there I was so excitedly enthralled (to the amusement of my dad!). I think when I go to places about which I have illusions, I know realistically that they are still just places, and may not 'be' everything I had imagined them to; I was surprised that in Europe my expectations were actually exceeded, and it was such a place to explore, there were so many intricate and incredible things there that I haven't known before. Then again, having been away from Australia for so long, I am seeing things scattered all through the ordinary here as well--not in a romanticised way, I mean, but just to say that things stand out, they feel new or vivid to be part of, even more real or something, and often subtly or half-consciously. Familiarity has a strange effect, at times a false one, I conclude.

On the first day we drove from Marion's house to Eisenach,. We looked around the town a bit and then went to Wartburg Castle. We were in such a hurry too, as it was getting late and we needed to move on; rushing up the very steep precipice to get to the castle was an experience! It was very cool. Then that night we stayed with an older couple in Maintal (before we planned this trip Dad joined a kind of travel community that allows you to stay with other families for a low cost, and it was really a good way of doing it), and they gave us a night tour of Frankfurt by car--I don't really like it there by day, but there are some buildings that come out prettily in the dark. It's nice to look around with locals, too.

The next day we went to Nuremberg, which was very interesting. Next we went to Rothenburg ob der Tauber, an impressive preserved medieval town; it was so rainy and cold, but fun! We got pastries there that they call schneeballen, which were huge and delicious.

That night we slept at the home of another couple, in Burgau. They were some of the nicest people ever; when, coming in the door, I heard a little voice call out "Opa?", I was very happy :) Their two year old grandson (the cutest little person!), along with his parents and one of the couple's other daughters, was staying. I really enjoyed our time with that family.

In the morning we left for nearby Augsburg, and caught the tram and looked around there for a while. There is so much to see there, and it's very historical; for a big town it just had a nice feel that day. Then we left for the Black Forest, near which we arrived in the evening. We stayed near Offenburg (we were very close to Strasbourg, but sadly didn't go as the next day was too busy to take time out just to have 'been in' France) in a small guesthouse that gave us the most impressive, cosy dinner and a sweet little room. It was very peaceful there, and I could definitely live there I think (on first impressions anyhow!). We woke early and went to a few nearby towns on the edge of the forest, just utterly beautiful, and then went to Gengenbach with some other places on the way. The wooden cuckoo-clocks we saw there were especially impressive. The forest was a real highlight of our time in Germany; it's an amazing part of the world. Then that day we also went to Bad Wimpfen, a town with Celtic and Roman history, a really sweet (though very expensive!) shop which I really liked a lot, and just a beautiful afternoon atmosphere for walking through: much quieter and less touristy than Gengenbach, and so interesting. Then we stayed in Bretzfeldt with the father of a family friend, and we also met her sister with her young family. I think they are some of the most welcoming, friendly people I've ever had a conversation with!

When we left it was our last day in Germany, and we went back to Frankfurt via Worms. After that we spent some time in Frankfurt (this time to a place which had a great vibe, with its buskers and smokey markets), had dinner there and then caught the plane. On the entire trip back I was too motion-sick for words--really bad even for me--so this was not fun, but we got back alright, and I'm so glad to be home to everyone and everything again (this has only been my third week in Sydney this year...). The best trip ever.

That's all for now. I still have the rest of my photos to upload, and will probably do that this afternoon if I can. There is much else to do, now that I'm feeling better again and readings and assignments are starting to happen. Today I think I will try to finish Beowulf. It's all rather good :)

nostos.

Tonight is our last night in Holland; we were in Germany this afternoon, but go back for almost a week now before heading home. This has been the most amazing holiday and I am really thankful. I'll miss it here, though I'm also starting to be almost ready to come home and start this year at uni and such.

On Sunday, as I mentioned, we went with Sophie and my uncles Wim and Rik to take Opa's ashes to the sand dunes nearby. It's a strange thing, and I've never seen something like it. It was sad, and I think I am glad to have been there. It was cold and raining and there was a really sharp wind, and everyone was quiet and Sophie was crying. When we got back Rik took us to Emmen, and with more tears I had to say goodbye to Sophie for the last time in a while. We had a good time together here.

Rik and his partner Rensje work with puppets and theatre, particularly for disabled people, children and elderly people, and the place where we slept at their place was in the big theatre room out the back, a kind of snoezel room with a theatre place in the middle. It was nice! With them we went to quite a few places, including an old Dutch fort called Boertange, the pre-historic hunebed graves, and a working windmill in which we spent an hour being shown around by the miller. One night we went to visit my second cousin, Oma's niece, who is seventy-something and really nice, along with her son. It was a refreshing week for me.

Today after farewelling Rik and Rensje and picking up the car we'll be using this week, we went to this beautiful place in Germany called Xanten. It is a very pretty medieval sort of town, and we didn't get to look around as much as I'd have liked because we arrived in the late afternoon, but what we did see was the ruins of Roman settlement there. It was unreal! I'm super happy to have been there, and it's definitely a highlight of our time here.

shepherd, shepherd, leave decoying.

We're at Marion's place again, and two nights ago her daughter Evelyn, who's about six years older than I--the only cousin I hadn't then met--came over, which was really lovely as she is a really nice girl. Mlein also had a friend over from school that afternoon, so it was doubly fun. We visited Linda at her house yesterday morning. Also, we've just decided that although we're leaving here for my uncle Rik's house today, we'll be back for a day later on; and I get to see Sophie and Wim once more this afternoon, which I'm really glad about as I'm seriously going to miss them. The last week has been nice.

A few days ago Sophie got the day off school and we went with our dads by train to Amsterdam. When I say by train, that also means by bus to the station and on the back of a bicycle to the bus--scary the first time, but fun as well! It's so different in Amsterdam to the rest of Holland that I've seen so far, being very much a city; it's very busy, and with trams and cars and especially thousands of bikes whizzing past everywhere the place just buzzes to walk through. There's a lot of history there and it's beautiful, and of course there's a tacky tourist vibe as well. It was only Sophie's second time there, so we found it interesting. It was a long day and a fun one.

The first thing we did was take a canal boat for an hour, looking at much of the city from the water. The boat's captain was good (very Dutch humour and also an amusingly blunt way of talking about things, it was funny), and there really was a lot to see. Next we walked around a bit and ended up spending over an hour in the Anne Frank house; it was so strange to be there, to see footage of those things and realise they happened on the same streets we were walking that day. It's too big a thing to really understand or feel. It was good to go there.

When we came out it was raining, so we went to a café with two little cats in it (sweet!) until it was dry again, then walked around the streets and decided to go to the Rijksmuseum where the Rembrandts and such are. It was really cool to see all that art, especially for real. You do kind of get the impression of the excess and pride of the 'patron' class at that time as well, and some of the attitudes and religious or cultural sentiments of the time become clear through the pictures probably even more than the writings. Of course certain works are beautifully composed and really masterfully painted. We spent a while there. After that we caught the tram back to the train and went home, stopping at a little pubfor dinner on the way, which was cosy and nice as it was quite cold outside and we were all tired. That night Sophie slept over in her room at Wim's house where I'd been sleeping (she's normally at Simone's). The next night she slept over again, after we went out to a Chinese restaurant for our last dinner together; she had an English test the next morning and had to learn two pages of irregular verb forms and also be able to recognise exactly which tense any verb is in, which is very hard, so I tested her for a while and that turned out to be quite funny. She's so nice to hang out with--my cousins are great :)

At the moment I am sitting in the lounge room, out the window of which I can see a small, distant window on the house behind, obscured a little by smoke from the chimney. For about twenty minutes now two silhouettes, of a girl with long plaited hair and a young boy, have been dancing across the room together--and now with teddy bears above their heads (sometimes flying). It's amusing, and nice.

Last night we went to a Valentijnconcert put on by the choir that Marion conducts, beautiful. It was in a little candlelit hall with stone walls and pretty design, and she arranged it so they sang classical love songs chronologically, composed from the sixteenth to the twentieth century in mostly English and German. The parts sounded lovely, and twice a harpist played a few songs in between the singing. So that was something of a treat.

This afternoon the whole family here is meeting because they waited for us to be here so they could sprinkle Opa's ashes where Oma's were placed; I don't know how I feel about this. We'll have to see.

And then this afternoon we're going to my other uncle and aunt's place, who are the only close relatives I haven't yet met here.

rhapsody.

Today is another quiet day. It's been raining and snowing a bit, and we're staying at home doing rather little. Tonight we'll call my other uncle to see if Jess can stay with us there for a few days, and maybe go over to Sophie's place for the evening. Tomorrow we're all going to Amsterdam. Also we have run out of vlokken, to my breakfastish disappointment. There are tiny little birds hopping about in the rain, on the tree outside the window just there, and they are sweet.

It's lovely and rare to just stop for a little bit. Winter here is cosy.

those are some nice stars.

Since writing last on Saturday, we've now spent over a day at Wim's house. Dad has gone to visit a friend (he had to take Wim's spare bike, so I couldn't come) and Wim is at work, so I'm here alone. It's a beautiful day, cloudy and very quiet but not that cold.

On Saturday night we caught the train to near Tilburg, and Wim's ex-wife Simone picked us up from the station. The two, though separated now, are still very involved in each other's lives, and Simone lives with my cousin Sophie, who is also fourteen, about five minutes' walk away. It's interesting, and unusual; in a way it is really nice, as we spent all of yesterday together and they usually also eat together, but Sophie says everything is easier for the family now. Anyway. It was late and cold when we arrived, so I stayed talking with Dad and Wim for a while and then went to bed. Wim is really interested in astronomy, and having researched it a lot for my Extension II story in High School and also having a real (though totally uncommitted) interest in the field, I am pretty impressed by some of the things he's shown me. He's really nice.

On Sunday we came together for lunch, which Sophie and her best friend Stacy (who is from England and has lived here for a year now) had prepared for us. They said they had stayed up till three in the morning talking after being out dancing till about midnight. Stacy tells me that the social life for under-fourteens in Holland is much better than anywhere else. They are rather sweet, very dolled up and capable and pop-music-y and still easy to get on with, despite my being older. I went for a walk with them, hung out with them for the afternoon, and then went with Sophie to watch her dancing lesson which was fun. Her friends also seemed to enjoy trying out their English :)

For lunch we had tea and hot bread rolls, with meat and cheese or with vlokken (a very traditional kind of chocolate flakes, delicious)--the same as I have had for every breakfast and lunch while I've been here, but a bit fancier because the girls had done it all nicely. After walking the dog and Sophie's dancing and all that, we had dinner and then sat in front of the open fire, watched TV for a while (it was a show called Banana Split, which is something like Candid Camera) and then walked home to Wim's place. It was a really good day. I've been learning some new things while I've been here, and having new experiences too, one of which is extended family. I sometimes see my family and child cousins in Adelaide, I rarely see my other family in Melbourne and such, and I never see family on this side of the world. I could get used to it.

I've posted some more pictures on Picasa as well, of the day we went to Helmond and of Oma's friend Mrs. van de Weij.

regarding the castle with a frozen moat.

As I write, we are about to leave my auntie Marion's house and catch the train with Dad's brother Wim to stay at his place. We've just had Uncle Leo's birthday party with Wim and two of Leo's sisters; Wim is still here, and Dad is packing. We'll be back here for a couple of days later on, so although the last few days have certainly gone fast it's nice not to have to say goodbye to anyone quite yet. It's good that way. Even as I meet people, it feels sad and strange to know how soon now we'll be leaving them.

Anyway. A piece of good news is that Suikerspin is found: this morning I went to say hello to him in his cage and he was missing! We put the cage outside and later on found him sleeping quite happily in his home--though he seemed much happier when we brought him in out of the cold. (I really want a hamster.)

I'm starting to pick up some Dutch, though only really a tiny bit. I can sometimes follow conversation, helped also by the etymological links to English and such, but will have to do a lot of work to even start to know it just a bit. I want to though. One thing I've noticed is the element of things that used to be in old, middle or early modern forms of English as well, but now aren't. Some of the inflection forms are like that; and I don't know a lot of Old English, but lots of words I've seen here and there are also turning up in Dutch words. For example I noticed that the word for king, koning, is a lot like cyning, and the word believer, geloof, is like geliefen, so I could work them out. Anyhow, it's a nice language to start speaking in bits and pieces. As I said elsewhere, pronouncing the spelling feels similar to reading Chaucer in the accepted way (like in those good Year Eleven days...).

The day I last wrote was a nice one: we went to Helmond, a nearby town, to buy a present for Leo (as I said, it was his birthday that day). On the way we stopped in at the local castle, which has been turned into a beautiful little museum of local history and of Dutch art.

When we got home Mlein and Leo were back, so we gave him presents, had a pear and caramel pie, and spent some time talking; then Marjolein and I got to properly hang out, which I really enjoyed. She's the loveliest girl, and she's been through some very hard times especially with her family splitting (her three older sisters live with their dad); her being unwell has also made her move to a school that is socially more difficult and where academically there is pressure not to do well. She doesn't fit in and is teased because she wants to be a friend to people who are really struggling, and she enjoys gothic style fashion, though she says she actually has a variety of tastes. She's really interesting. In a way she's very fourteen-year-old, of course, but she's also insightful and also really compassionate and accepting. We got on straight away: she's vibrant and friendly and fun, and a great conversationalist even in English. She showed me some of her drawings and poems and her favourite music (she's also obsessed with a German band called Tokyo Hotel), and I showed her lots of photos and convinced her to come to Australia with me :) So I rather enjoyed that, and I just so wish I were around more often here.

[Having written most of this on Saturday night, I finish and post it on Monday; I was going to tag it on with today's thinkings, but I find they are long enough alone.]

bicycles and other things.

I am writing from Holland! At the moment it is Thursday morning; we arrived on Tuesday night. It is so beautiful, I've completely fallen in love with the place and it's wonderful here. I wish you were here and I could show you...

I've never travelled overseas before (well, not since I came here at three months old--apart from that the furthest from home I've ever gone is Darwin, a few weeks ago). The flight was long and I don't fly well, so I felt ridiculously unwell from Singapore to Frankfurt and only slept a couple of hours out of the thirty-four we spent travelling, but it doesn't matter. I have to say it makes all the difference to be flying with someone as well, which I've never done, and it's been nice so far to spend more time with Dad in a different way to usual, and for him not to be really busy, and to be here where he grew up and meet his family, and all that. On the flight I'd been looking forward to having so much time to read (I have a few books, most notably Ulysses, to make a dent in before second semester) but being unwell I watched a few films instead. The highlight was getting up a few times and seeing my first glimpse of European cities by night: Warsaw was the first I think.

We arrived in Frankfurt (this is where the amazing flight deal was to) early in the morning, and a few hours later caught the 300 km/h train to Holland. The little towns just outside Frankfurt are simply gorgeous, and there's so much that is lovely about Holland and how country-like it is all the way through that makes me wonder why my dad ever left. You should see the little houses! They look friendly, and so many of them look very farm-like and old-Dutch. There are dykes and canals and everything, and so many horses and such here as well, which reminds me of when I lived in Kellyville for a few years when I was very young and it was still completely rural (my favourite place I've ever lived)--except that here their paddocks are full of snow! I really love so much about Australia, and of course that's where family and friends are, but apart from that I could definitely live in Holland and will really be sad to leave. It's cold at the moment, and the colours, particularly the greens, are much less saturated than at home, so I can see how it may be a sort of grey place to live in constantly, but for me it is just delightful and home-like and so beautiful. I took a few pictures from the train, but it was so fast that most of what I've seen I haven't yet caught on camera. Anyway, taking the train much of the way across the country before even stepping out was a nice way to arrive there, and I definitely recommend this.

After changing trains twice and sitting next to some really sweet Dutch students who had a good conversation with my dad, being asked directions in a language I didn't know, and finally getting to the place where my auntie was going to pick us up, we found that she hadn't yet arrived so I had a bit of a wander in the nearby stores, including a little florist's shop. Then we went home and I met my youngest cousin from that family, Marjolein, who is fourteen and so still lives at home, as well as my uncle and the hamster and the two cats, and I stayed up as long as I could and then slept. So I woke at about half past five the first morning, and I opened the curtains and everywhere was snow. I've never seen snow before, and I think a part of me has now been found at last :) I love being here.

Yesterday Dad's sister Marion took us to Heusden, a very historical little place with windmills and little old streets, and I so admired it. It feels strange that this is my first time seeing streets and places like there are here, because in a way they are a big part of our awareness of our history and where we're from--for me anyhow. It feels more familiar than strange, though also very first-time-exciting. So beautiful; and I'm such a tourist! On the way we went past their old childhood house, and it started properly snowing and it was just good to be there. We also visited the store where Dad and his friends used to hang out. I have learnt a lot about him. Marion is his youngest sister and they share a lot in common, so their conversations about life (old and recent) are interesting to hear.

Then we went to the best pancake house, and I had this amazing, big pancake with salmon and bree, while they had apple and cinnamon ones (the cinnamon here is good); then we walked around a little more in the town and the snow. The temperature was a bit below zero, but surprisingly it doesn't feel that cold here. I'm actually really liking it (though this could be because I've escaped the current heat wave in Australia). I'd love to live here for a while.

There's so much more to tell, but for now I need to get going again as we're about to go out. Last night I also met my cousin Linda (who is twenty-five) and her boyfriend Sven, and that was really fun. I can't believe I have all this family who I've never known, and I wish the world were so much smaller. Anyway, it's good to be here. Today Dad's sister is taking us somewhere, I can't remember where to, so I need to finish getting ready for that. It's also my uncle's birthday, though he and M'lein are both out at the moment. I'll write more properly, and also post some pictures (I have lots!), when I can.

to get one's fill.

I just found MDST, and I don't know how I missed it. The Centre for Medieval Studies, that is, and its small number of extra History subjects, which were hiding from me when I enrolled at uni this year...

So. I am rather excited that I will be picking up 'Medieval Cosmology' next semester, whose sessions look a bit like so:
The antique background 1: Aristotle’s cosmology / The antique background 2: Ptolemy’s astrology / The early Middle Ages 1: Christianity versus Greek learning / The early Middle Ages 2: Astronomy, computus and the microcosm / The rise of universities and the new learning / Aristotelian cosmology and Christian theology / Judicial astrology / Natural philosophy and astrological physics / Magic / Medieval world maps / Medieval cosmology, astrology and the scientific revolution. (And you should see the texts in the reader.)

I know, right! Super happy with this. We'll be looking at ancient ideas/paradigms, along with the other part of our European heritage in what was pre-'civilised' and what was simply 'secular', and how it all fitted together for the certain groups of people who lived there. It will be challenging I think to keep my head in a class full of young medievalists of all kinds, particularly those with a range of opinionated (and to me at times bewildering) ideas that may have created for them as well an interest in this course. I'll just need to stay really on top of the reading and ideas, and I know I'll learn an awful lot historically (and personally, and socially) as well by doing so. I really look forward to it. It's also likely to well compliment the medieval myth and legend literature I'm studying for my English unit next semester. So hopefully next year the Ancient subjects are better than they were this time, but for now I don't mind the lack of competitive options.

Also, there are only four days now till Europe! Perhaps it is right for me to feel rather blessed at present.

sprookjes.

Today I went to the Holland House, which is a bit of a tourist land of Dutch things but is also exciting for me. At the back they always have a basket of 'Free books--please give them wings', and there I found two volumes each of Sprookjes van Grimm and Sprookjes van Anderson. I'm trying to learn some Dutch, so I was a little pleased with this :)

We've just started planning the specifics of our week in Germany, too! It's starting to feel real...

response to an otherwise insignificant thing.

The great discord is rising, and there is joy.
Harmonies collide and night is filled by inky light.
Wait until you see them there.
Wait until the sounds sift out your mind:
not the expected.

This song is still the same one we've sung for years,
and this little place is more familiar than myself.
Even so, it all has changed.
Even so, we witness something new,
just like you said.

In between the ideas,
this is the thing we were trying to say.
The answer is loud and we are glad.

We have built our worlds atop our moments,
and the people and the places there inside of them;
we are hollow without them.
We are wondering how it could have been
without those things.

Finally it falls and we are open,
now leaving the old and tentative steps behind us.
It is so good to be here.
From them sunlight comes, like an encore
in new mornings.

Underneath the spoken,
there is a place we are longing to go.
Till we find it we hold on to this.

new things.

The exciting news: I probably get to go to Europe in February! A really cheap airfare deal, the fact that Dad is going anyway to see his family and the way I've been wanting to go for ages all worked together into such a wonderful event, and I'm so excited! I've never done anything like this. It's for just over three weeks, most of which we'll spend in Holland, but we'll probably also get a train pass for a week and stay places with friends of friends if we can in other countries. And we'll see about others. I can't wait to see places, since Europe has so much history and culture that I've never seen here, and I'll finally get to spend time with my family too. Happy.

So in January we're going to the south coast and then I'm going to see April in Darwin for a week, and then this in February... Crazy. I can't believe it. Temperature extremes will be interesting too.

And I was distracted enough before, and now I simply can't possibly study for these exams! But I have to. The countdown to the best holidays ever is five days :D

Tahpanhes.

The last few days I've had this playing on my mind. I really want to listen and hear what God actually, personally has to say. But I don't feel responsible at all right now. Just tired, unsure of where he's at and what is him and what actually isn't; trying to divide between things driven by grace and those that aren't when it takes an effort. Even when things are all really good, even with the best intentions, you feel it so much when you forget how to come close, and closer, into him. You realise you can't possibly go on for much longer like that.

What wouldn't I give to see and hear more clearly?! But I guess that's just the thing.

still on my mind.

Yesterday was the final lunch for this year of AIME--Australian Indigenous Mentoring Experience, for Year Ten kids from schools near my uni. It was good fun. I'm so impressed at how effective the programme is--the students are great people, and they've changed and grown heaps this year. A lot of them told me yesterday that they're planning to stay on to the HSC and hopefully go to uni, neither of which they ever thought they'd do. It's so encouraging to see them equipped like this, and it's inspiring that they're so determined to respect their teachers and influence younger Indigenous students at their schools--some of which are pretty tough places to be. I've had a great time, and learnt heaps too about what it takes to make something like this work. It's great. I feel like I owe so much more than I can imagine for the chance to live in this country, and I want to understand better and be there if I can where there's such huge need.

Speaking of owing, today a girl from my Modern tutorial thanked me for something I helped her with and was like "I owe you..."--I felt like replying that I totally owe her, so it's no big deal. Then I felt like that's an interesting feeling to have, that idea of love that knows that it belongs not one bit to itself, and wants more than anything to see people met by the love it's known. I'm very aware of it. Why is that such a rich and deeply happy awareness, one of the greatest things we have?

This is cool too... On the train on the way home, a little German girl called Rochelle was sitting with her Papa a behind me; when the cleaning lady came through the carriage, the girl took the flowers she must have picked during the day and gave them all to the lady, which pretty much made her day. I thought it was lovely :)

nineteen.

The only time I've felt like this before is the last day of 2005. Tomorrow is my nineteenth birthday, and I feel like I've been eighteen for way too long. Without real reason I'm somehow feeling so ready, just hankering, for a fresh year with new things in it. So although things were incredibly different a few years (but long ones) ago, the feeling of waiting for a year to close, the quiet relief and excitement, is just the same. It's been a good year and an interesting one, nothing like any of the ones before it and in some ways a million times easier and clearer, but it's good to move on when a time is old.

I was talking with a friend yesterday, and I decided that nineteen is the best age to be right now: it's in a kind of hazy half-zone between teenager and adult, so I can pick and choose at leisure but partially have both for another year :) I also sense that the tone of this year will set the course for the start of my adult life probably more than many of my previous years, and I'm thinking a bit about this.

For the last few months, being in a totally different environment and also being on the other side of a few big things I've had to learn, a lot of the old anchors I've held have been taken away; I've had to be careful as I've explored life in the light of knowing God. That's been an important process and in the end it has strengthened what I value and the way I chase it, but now I just want to rekindle a heart that is always warm towards God, totally swept away by the assumption of his truth as it has been proven to me time and again--even though I realise too well how caught up I am in my culture and the not-yet-clarity of what I trust in. I am really willing to let him lead me through this ever-changing world that I could never grasp or be equipped for on my own. I'm so ready to re-route back onto a plane of simplicity, even within intricacy, and just start being more responsible in the little things that are clear to me at this point. That's what I hope will characterise this year, and I know that it's a fertile place for growing, learning, being challenged and vulnerable and being made soft and strong, more and more aware of dependence on his forever trustworthy closeness.

the sounds.

I reverently listen
to the clamouring symphony running through our blood.
You come and sit beside me as we look towards your face.

Where is the word that will silence when it speaks?
Astounded, we gaze here at a library of faces,
your heart like the sky, the colliding seas.
Where between these covers is the pen to draw the lines
of a face, of a name, of the road to your home?
All have heard the speaking word, but who has understood it?

We turn from this tower with a world of tongues in our mouths
and drift across the earth, though we chase a single sun.
We have walked together on a thousand roads at once
and it troubles me.

We are all sleeping, hushed with hoping.
Each heart is caught in many dreams of morning.
Still, we wait side by side, and I know we will wake together
like those who wake to sing for the sun when it rises.

ich spreche viele Sprachen.

The fourth of October, already? This is madness. Years just fly, and things keep happening and changing, just so fast.

I've been waking up early now that it's warmer, and I like that. Today it was raining; it still is, on and off. I'm working on finishing my Bonhoeffer essay today, so the rain is really nice.

Hey, it's my birthday in ten days :)

wanderlust.

I really want to go and visit my family in Holland, and spend some time there. It's rather expensive though, so I'm thinking not any time soon. Yesterday I non-seriously asked my dad when he would take Joel and me, since Steven got to go last time; he said, more seriously, that since I went with him to Adelaide last year and Joel has never travelled with him, he'll probably just take Joel next time he goes.

Adelaide. Not fair!

Still, the Arts units for next year have happily come out now :) The History topics are pretty limited in range, but I like what I've chosen. I get two each for English and History (plus four Education ones): I think in first semester I'll do the one on early medieval Anglo-Saxon/Scandinavian myths and literature, and one on ancient Greek and Roman literary history and how they recorded, invented, valued and exploited it; in second semester, the twentieth century Modernist literature subject, and one exploring urban tradition in Italy from ancient to medieval and Renaissance to modern times. Should be good fun :D

the old sails sing their song.

In days long gone I was someone else.
We spent our days always together.
She taught me a rhyme, but it had no tune;
I forget what once it meant.

She gave me a doll, but it had no name.
She built us a town, but it had no bridge.
She made a doll’s house, and it had no fire
but the smoke of the towers in the night.

Here in the darkness we try to remember.
Even the shadows on the wall
have faded out of reach,

and here are the echoed sounds that surround us,
opening their mouths for the audience of mountains.
On backs of mountains old, rivers climb down
and mingle with the salt of the ocean.

Here there are sounds, but there is no light.
Gazing at the formless song, we know
that day is passed—and also night is passed,
but morning is forgotten.
Gone with songs,
our years of songs,
and days devoured, those weary whispered words.

Quiet. Close your eyes.
She sang to me, in the soft hum of the stillest night.
In my mind I ran,
on the sand of the song.

Touch the rocks, or feel the sky. I stand atop
the sea cliff. All the open blue, sails as I sit
beneath the sun, and birds above.
Bright waves crashing, winged throats calling,
circling song: memory steals
my old wild eyes.

as long as a piece of string.

My cat is an inside cat, and isn't supposed to go outside--but she does, when she's too fast at the door or when my family feels sorry for her. Today I caught her pouncing on a brown mouse (actually, my little dog Kailye told on her and made me come and see, as she did with the bird and the lizards: I think hunting distresses her!), and I told Josana off, let the mouse go and made the cat come inside. My parents and my brother are not very happy with me for punishing the cat for doing what she's 'supposed to do', and maybe they have a point about mice who get into the house. Fair enough. But it's not like she goes hungry; and I suppose the little mouse and his family, if they heard our conversation, would be relieved to hear his plight at least considered. I think that makes all the difference :P

Anyway. Today I'm working with my HSC English notes, as one of my Year Twelve friends is coming over to study. It's making me anxious, just reading them again! Haha. I should have done it last night, but instead I went out to Thai with Vic's family to celebrate her finally finishing, and then we went back and watched bits and pieces of films--finally settling on V for Vendetta, which I hadn't watched before, and consequently getting to sleep at about two a.m. Such a good night.

I can't believe it's only been a year since I left school. It feels like so much longer.

leisure.

Yay... Finally finished! And from today I have a reading week in which to happily stay home, write two more essays that are due the next week, spend time with a few friends, and do all the other things that take my fancy :)

Speaking of holidays, I really want to find more work for the summer break. Where will I work? That is the question.