when dad was drunk & romantically inclined his
favourite story was how he saved mum's life/ how
he stopped her from drowning/ we all knew that
mum couldn't swim/ so this was the one time
when she needed him/ it made us uncomfortable/
their early relationship days without us/ could she
have loved him?/ not in need of our protection?/
after the story dad came up behind her when she
was suds up to elbows at the kitchen sink & she
said 'get away gary' but she was laughing/ her blue
rubber gloves chopping up the dish water/ rusky
growled beneath the laminex table & brendon &
dale punched into dad's knees/ later that night
when dad rolled around drunk throwing cushions
from the loungeroom floor/ dale scratched his face
& drew the blood/ i thought of her dark long hair
floating in the brown river/ dad rushing towards
her as the hair became less & less/ more like a
shadow on the surface than a woman's hair/ dad
said 'you three wouldn't have been born unless i
saved your mother"/ so dad saved all our lives that
day by the river/ but when he dragged her out her
eyes cut through him/ she was like ice/ like the
backyard frost beneath the clothesline/ then he
saved her life again in the patrol car incident/ he
told her to sit in the back/ mum sulked but he
insisted it was intuition/ a few minutes later a
speeding car went through a give way sign & ran
into them/ she would have been instantly killed/
the crush of steel reaching his hip & touching the
wheel where his hands rested/ she never said a
word/ she only pouted & looked into the side of
the vehicle that was all crushed in/ like him
