She tells me her pain is a squall,
sudden and vicious, like a flash
storm whipping in from Bass Strait
to batter King Island.
<i>Do you remember our Island, Garth?</I>
Her doctors build shelters; nurses
batten hatches, but this tempest
won’t blow over. She says her pain is a vulture now,
circling the desert on threadbare wings.
<i>A glass of water if you please, Garth?</I>
With beak and claw, it slashes and rips
nerve endings, drinks color from her eyes.
The pain is no longer squall or vulture,
she whispers, but a flutter of pages.
<i>One last story before bed, dear Garth?</I>
I don’t tell her that I’m her grandson—
not her brother Garth, stolen by war.
She’s a thin sheet stretched over an empty
bed; a gull’s cry on the wind.
<I>first published by Eunoia Review</I>
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