careful triangles of bread
ham and cheese, maybe pickle
if you're lucky mayo and egg
a beer before the yardarm's hit
the twelve o'clock mark
'Well, it was an early start'

sausage and sauce for the kids
plenty of small talk
'How's work been lately,
​you busy mate?'
Dougie telling tale of Vietnam
how he caught some flak
couldn't be further away from Khe Sanh
and thank-God-for-that

cordial, a cup of tea
bikkies meticulously arranged
tied to the fencepost
dogs straining on leashes
salivating occasional tidbits

faux grass
and a smatter of children
heads bobbing
a field full of poppies
and a cockatoo white
in the sky as a dove

every year
adds a couple more kids
abseiling the cannon
every year, a couple less diggers
And we couldn't be further
from Tobruk or Flanders
and thank-bloody-God-for-that


Kathryn Ross April 25th, 2016



Copyright Kathryn Ross    2016

my mother is quietly ill
and I can't bring myself 
to despise the fly
that has tormented us
for days
I'm sure he is unwitting
the cells in her body
know even less they are killing


Kathryn Ross  April 18th, 2016



Copyright Kathryn Ross 2016

Three hundred and eighty-one days
the buses stood idle
and I wonder of James
Did he sit around playing card games
while the wheels  of his bus
and the status quo rusted
and the rubber slowly perished
A bus seems such an unlikely place
to take a stand

She wasn't as old as you think
and no more weary than usual
but she was tired
of the way things stood
as she pulled a quilt
of quiet resistance
up around her chin

And her husband forbidden
to speak of the case
forced to throw his job in
and the phone kept on ringin'
and the voices were slimy with death

Three hundred and eighty-one days
they car-pooled or walked
sunshine or rain
and the woman considered
​least likely
to make the wheels tremble
remained in her seat, didn't shout
and everyone listened cause
every so often
quietly speaks the loudest

Kathryn Ross  April 16th, 2016

(title 'so much depends' taken from the first line of 'The Red Wheelbarrow' by William Carlos Williams)


Copyright Kathryn Ross   2016

There is a rumour here
that whispers of itself

beyond these flattened
cardboard boxes
who'd forgotten
they have volume

who let the stamp
become the image
saw the rippled sea floor
but not the tides
that moved it's passage

So crane your memory
to kinder days
of primary coloured
folded poster paint

butterflies poised
to launch from the page
in rows and rows
of inkblot tests

that nobody cared
to decipher

strung and drying
like Tibetan prayer flags
quietly reminding ~
you need two wings to fly

Kathryn Ross   15th April, 2016



Copyright Kathryn Ross   2016

I am an image
carved in air
as windmill blades
will slice
the rhythms
of the breeze

and there are
turbines
in my lungs
that fashion
every breath
into language

when
we were small
we wondered at
the colour
of the wind

and if we could
shape our words
to the thickness
of atmospheres
around us

what if my words
are shaped to fit
perfectly
the angle
of your ear

the fine
cochlear hairs
bending
to the shuffle
of my breath

they say
everything is shaped
in waves
what if my voice
is the ocean

and closing in again
the air around me
like water mends
the wake
and still the ache
a gentle ringing
in my ear
like muscle memory

Kathryn Ross  12th April 2016


​Copyright Kathryn Ross 2016

He left his signature
on your skin
in a perfect calligraphy
of healing
knotted in rows of ants
sutured with reassuring words
and the enormity
of a five year tick

How you had me graffiti
his name on your breast
with the words
'he woz ere'
emblazoned in ink

Oh but  you should have seen the look on his face

And the rest of us
puddled about
with snow-filled mittens
and helpless hands
restocking the fridge
in perpetual clink
and shuffle
of casserole dishes

You know he really admired your penmanship


Kathryn Ross 
April 8th, 2016



​Copyright Kathryn Ross 2016

gather up the offcuts
old fence palings
down the side shed
beg Dad for a couple a nails
or pinch 'em
from that new house
going up, shiny and strewn
like   they    weren't   even   something   precious
rusty hammer
Yes, we'll be very careful

A door of flannelette
sheeted and pinned
to the wall the rules of etiquette
a broken watch
so we'll always know
the time anyway, who cares
Mum'll yell out coo-ee if

Your dinner's on the table going stone bloody cold. Where have you been?

decorator dandelion
drooping in a jar
splash of yellow
ragbag quilt, a cardboard box
to rest our elbows on
sweepings of pine needles
softness for a bed
and quickly kissing Tommy Sinclaire
scent of grass-stained jeans

and something dry like hay
or sunshine
a book to read
or Mum's old magazines
crosswords near complete
serrated pages
where the recipes have been

mostly it was tribal
seclusion and exclusion
Build your own whydontcha!
No boys allowed!
except for Tommy Sinclaire, yeah
he's alright, we'll let him in


Kathryn Ross   April 11th, 2016



Copyright kathryn Ross 2016 

Regarding stillness
I looked
in all the usual places
placid lakes layered in ripple
riverbed chatter
water and stone
and the hover
and static buzz of insects
shuffle of silt and sand
at the shoreline
the constant inundate
of my breath
Everything's kinetic
and there's the bind
For in the journeying
resides arrival
and in the seeking of it ~
finding

Kathryn Ross   9th april 2016
​


Copyright Kathryn Ross 2016