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from Theatre Country
Lullaby
For now, and while the rain
is picking at the window,
elephants are people too,
and kings and queens
with family anxieties
and an administration to run.
No doubt, and because
that’s half the frisson,
their rule falls far short
of the sinful eucalyptus city
where the banksia men
neglect to wash behind
their ears and generally
get up to no good.
While in the country
the rowdy mustelids
stay up all night, letting
their shirts become untucked.
Nor should you under-
estimate the influence of diet:
after a night of quirky
sounds and exposure
a decent plate of porridge
will make a mole of you.
Fit and proper, in fact,
to take the branch line train
that puffs with cheek:
forever chasing after its bigger
siblings, forever forgetting
its place in creation.
The problem, and bad landings
between paving stones will
confirm this, is that
walking home from school,
the sky a distant sort of blue,
you encounter them:
eccentrics, orphans, foreigners,
with rings in their ears,
who bust in from another
story altogether, shaking
the counterpane like a rumour,
and wheedle you away
with promises of pagodas,
islands and inventions,
offering you delights you know
you shouldn’t accept; but already
you’re into the box,
your fingertips are dusted:
already you’re asleep.
[uncollected, Theatre Country: fifteen landscape studies, 2000]
© The Estate of Bill Sewell 2004
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