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Day Two
I. THE BRE ROO WORKS
2. The Presence of The Poet
The manager's son wouldn't let me take a photo
because he said, that 15 years ago
Greenpeace tried to make out, that kangaroos were taken
for human consumption.
Dad said, "They've been caught before, they know it's wrong."
The manager's son said, "The boys 'ill give you a hard time."
I said, "I think I can handle it."
Once inside,
I said, "I don't need a camera.
I take photos with my heart."
He didn't like that too much.
Dad said, "'e was terrified when ya took a shot of the gum tree outside
& don't write that, we'll get burnt down."
They know it's wrong.
He was suspicious from the start.
When I said I was a poet
he said, "You write poems about funny things."
When I walked back to the car
he followed me there.
He said, "You can take some photos of the fence over there.
You shouldn't get into any trouble out here."
So I took a couple of shots of him.
Later on, when they were developed
you could see how much
he hated me being there.
In the photo he was wondering
whether he had done the right thing
by even letting me inside at all.
He said, "We don't know where these photos will end up."
He wasn't worried about poetry.
Yet it is in my poetry & thinking of the portrait of him on my film
that I label him: The King Of Blood.
Dad said, "Don't write that
or they'll burn us down."
He also said,
"When ya went inside with that big camera
a bloke ran out the back way.
'e was all nervous,
lightin' up a cigarette out the back.
'is 'ands were shakin'.
'e almost dropped the butt.
Ya don't take photos in there Coral, you'll terrify 'em.
The place is full of dead-beats.
They're all either on the dole or on the run.
That bloke that came out said, 'That's Gary 'oles daughter in there.'
'e wasn't goin' back in 'till you had gone.
'e nearly pissed on 'is own shoe." |
