sticks and stones

My skin had the capacity,

when I was young

and the ozone was still whole

and the sun friendly, not harsh,

to turn dark in summer.

 

I would find time

before the beach holiday to lie

outside and soak like a reptile

in the rays,

dream myself away from time and space

into a red shifting land of puzzles and flight.

 

People would look at me

tanned skin on display in shorts and singlet

and call me abo or darkie - it hurt me nought;

it is nothing to be called something

when you are not

when the comment is only about the tan you have acquired

and not

the person you are, the associated

forest of faults and failures and reasons

you can be treated differently.

 

When I was a boy

tanning myself those distant summers

of long ago I had a book,

the flora and fauna of Australia.

Along with kolas and paperbark

were pictures of aborigines –

part of the wild landscape (there is the insult)

and in that book

if you held it close to your ear

I am certain you would hear a faint whisper,

“black lives matter,”

but it was the sixties and the call

was only heard by a few,

the rest told Abo jokes

while stealing their children,

their stories, land and sacred sites.

 

When I was young and innocent

and knew in winter I would be white again

the words touched me not;

sometimes now I wake

regret the Medusa able to turn me to stone,

unable to change the way it was

and still wishing I could.