Ambrose Ambles

 

The Mallee Wood.

When you enter the Mallee woods,

Pray..leave your ‘self’ outside..

For there is no room in the Mallee wood,

For nature’s purity of the senses,

And all that human pride.

So let us enter the Mallee woods,

Stepping softly..breathing deep,

Eyes seeing only what they need to see,

In the mallee woods so deep.

So ancient are the trees there,

Holding secrets they have to keep.

 

Songs we sung..long echos ring,

Within the tranquil, silent air..

A wooden-spoked cart, two wheeled,

Remains an old remnant there,

That some obscure pioneer used,

Endlessly clearing those rocky fields,

Dragging, loading, that horse-drawn dray..

Then broken, abandoned, left to rot away.

The Mallee trees know the story,

Their limbs hover to tell the tale,

Whispering in a lowing sigh,

The scratching bark tells of futile travail.

 

“Breakheart Country” it hisses,

“Your tears and frets to no avail,

You will give what is demanded,

And then go on your way.”

There is fixed wisdom in trees rooted here,

Ancient knowledge under bough and canopy,

So weep not for what the cost,

Be it sweat, blood..love lost..

Each regret etched in the leaves of the trees,

A history feted and now sadly fated

To fear that which seems certain to be.