Another Funeral:

(For cousin Terry)

There are no lessons in this,

He was Terry known as George to his family,

He was my cousin, the only son

Of my father’s only brother;

I do not know his children, he and my days

were years ago before women and girls and alcohol.

Bright days when Terry filled me with his ideas,

His facts and his thrill of adventure;

Yabbying in the old lake at Moonee Ponds,

Turning lights off up and down Airport West streets,

Sinking in a raft he built and I floated in -

Terry was older and wiser than me

In those faraway times of our childhood.

And now he has gone

And the many times I thought to catch up with him

Are in ruins but his memory runs strong

Through all that I do, especially in the words

I write and the stories I love to construct.

He was Terry known as George,

He was my cousin and in the years of my childhood

When the sun shone bright and the rain always left us,

He was my friend.