Rallentanda

Rallentanda

Sunday, September 11, 2011

LOSS OF INNOCENCE

d verse

the golden goose watched him
from the shadows

his face a beatific vision
aglow with happiness
at that woman's arrival

he clasped her hands firmly
in a beautiful welcome
pleased at her return

dazzled by his warm affection
the golden goose had finally witnessed
some thawing in the iceman
and was pleased
to have her premonitions
proved wrong

not long after
she learnt that he had
sent that woman to her death
with that clasp

he smiled as he related the story
to mother goose with frozen indifference

she listened expressionless
and internally shuddered
she knew her head was
next for the chopping block

the golden goose
had become egg bound
and was not laying any more

"for once in your life
don't be a goose"
she said to herself

"stop producing golden eggs
stop believing in people"

8 comments:

  1. to me this is very sad...mother goose representing innocent creativity of childhood for me lost in a moment...

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  2. T'is sad indeed Brian.The complexity of humans with the presence of good and evil more pronounced in some individuals will always be a constant source of amazement to me..Thanks for the comment.

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  3. Rall, I've just skimmed (slowly, like a flat stone) through your recent poems, stopping and rippling and picking up speed and setting down again - I enjoyed them all, especially mother goose and the shadow puppet

    and I think your cow photo (painting?) is exquisite

    the Indonesian pictures remind me of rural Malaysia where I was exiled previously for 3+ years

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  4. Ah Isabel,your written expression is so poetic and such a delight to read. That cow painting is one of my favourites in the NSW Art Gallery. It captures that cool brisk winter early morning feel in the country.I must find out the name of the painting and label it. Thanks for your visit.
    Pop in again for tea and lamingtons:)

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  5. Painting + location explains it - I must have seen it there. I think you can smell the sweet hot breath of the cows and feel your fingers tingling in the cold.

    On the boring rivalry (on the part of Mebournians anyway) twixt Sydney and Melbourne, I saw a piece in The Age last week noting the forthcoming retirements of the directors of the AGNSW and the NGV - and how both looking for candidates would stretch the talent pool. Perhaps it was meant tongue in cheek (I doubt it), but the writer stated that the AGNSW would struggle to compete against the attractions of the NGV. I don't know enough about Gallery politics to comment intelligently but found it rather droll.

    Are you still in Indonesia?

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  6. Yes...May make this home again (out of the wet season ie)

    Am returning to Oz soon...

    I don't know about gallery politics either.

    However I do know that nothing could coax me into visiting Melbourne...such a bleak city in spite of expensive attempts to save it:)

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  7. children, elderly parents and abandoned dog are the reasons - hardly universal!

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  8. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh Isabel...I forgot you were a Melbourne person.This just proves that Sydnesiders richly deserve their reputation for brashness and superficiality compared to our more intellectual and serious Melbourne brethren
    ( Of course I don't mean word of this:)

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