Swizzle Stick

Australian Gothic

April 13 — Intersection of nature and civilization

in the bushland
cathedral silence
is the white noise
under birdcalls,
rustlings underfoot,
the mechanical, maniacal
burring of insects
the roof of grey-green leaves
is a sky within a sky
I see the rude banality
of my blue sneakers

what is this horror
shot through the landscape
this uncanny forest
its eyes watching me
& up ahead I see
a form, limp & lifeless
hanging from a tree

there are no crows
while the scarecrow swings
in faded, filthy
flannelette
his head facelessly
aimed at the ground
with nothing
to see or to say

I look away
make him sink back
into bushland
camouflaged in the gumtrees
as I stride ahead
into blue-eucalypt
listening silence

when I look back
he is gone
no man hangs
from any silent tree
there is nobody here
in the bushland but me



The Australian mountain forests are funereal, secret, stern. Their solitude is desolation … In the Australian forests no leaves fall. The savage winds shout among the rock clefts. From the melancholy gums strips of white bark hang and rustle. The very animal life of these frowning hills is either grotesque or ghostly. Grey kangaroos hop noiselessly over the coarse grass. Flights of white cockatoos stream out, shrieking like evil souls. The sun suddenly sinks, and the mopokes burst out into horrible peals of semi-human laughter … Marcus Clarke 1846-1881