where bangalow palms and prickly tree ferns began

i remembered you. from the tarmac

to your small yellow car i missed half your words

relearning your strange accent, distracted

by this foreign world we were yet again traversing

of white sand, clear skies and diving pools.

he drove us along roads that wound like racing tracks

drifting from side to side lost and dizzied, you stuck

to my side, then my brother’s, like the same moving being.
a gentle wheeze of nicotine and lavender-rose

escaped the front door and i soon found

the things we had forgotten. floral duvets and photo albums,

two wall clocks set at different times.

the table fans whirring in unison, clapping the blinds

against the windowsill as if to say welcome home.

we took over the couch, four bodies collapsed and moulded in.

you muted the television and told us stories

of violent wars and cobblestoned streets, the ache

in your side when you thought about darwen tower

and the journey across desert and sea.

your cup overflowed with wine

as you shuffled playing cards with newly refilled fingernails,

the red tap-tap on the plastic backs

like a timer counting you down.
after lights out, we lay awake to noises we didn’t know.

our bodies showered in sticky sweat, breathing

the hum of cicadas and the faint smell of sugarcane leaking in

through the fly-screen window. we imagined

human-sized grasshoppers and bunyips in the creek.

you knew, and opened the door before midnight.

leading us outside you pointed to the swell

of cane toads lining the road. we stepped

between them carefully like a delicate game of lava

my brother pretending to be one, his cheeks

expanding and retracting in the humid moonlight.
in the morning you were tired, he took us to the beach.

my brother and i whispered about whether we should call

him grandad as he marched us up the sand dunes and told us

about the ocean and the next landform it would meet.

we found a pufferfish, dead and bloated

just back from the shoreline by a bed of seaweed and foam.

he held us back like it was a crime scene

we looked up at him then, eyes of wonder and intent,

his slightly brimming with salt water. he bent down

in that way old people do when they have stories to tell

and said, ‘let’s go find a big stick.’
you joined us in the rainforest where birdsong felt swollen

with rain. flicking a leech off my leg, you told me

i must taste extra sweet. in a quiet clearing,

you showed us a tree that had been taken over

by ferns. brilliant green roots clasped

onto the furrows of the bark, a tangle of antlers and scars.

it was the most magical thing i had ever seen

where thousands of mosquitos danced in the water

gathered at the bottom of each green nest.

and i wondered how the tree felt about being taken over

by something so foreign. you coughed deeply

when you laughed at our wonder

and held us tight like your two little trees

you, the epiphyte.