VIII. On freedom from anger and on meekness
To not swing the hammer.
To unhook this rope from the spine.
To swallow and swallow and swallow.
To peer through the clean window.
To crack the back’s pinched nerve.
To loose the teeth from the jaw.
To breathe out that corner of air from the lungs.
When the heart beats like a rabbit drumtumbled stone.
When the hand’s fingers are splayed.
When standing silent outside the door.
When the sun slips from the eye.
When the eye drops from the skull.
When the whole body is parenthetical.
When breath is all thickness, all liquid.
Margaret Bashaar via elimae
I couldn’t have put words to it as a boy, but later I understood what seized my imagination that day. How strange it was to see men do something beautiful. Something pointless and elegant, as though nobody saw or cared… For all those years when Loonie and I surfed together, having caught the bug that first morning at the Point, we never spoke about the business of beauty. We were mates but there were places our conversation simply couldn’t go. There was never any doubt about the primary thrill of surfing, the huge body-rush we got flying down the line with the wind in our ears… We talked about skill and courage and luck - we shared all that, and in time we surfed to fool with death - but for me there was still the outlaw feeling of doing something graceful, as if dancing on water was the best and bravest thing a man could do.
Tim Winton, Breath
pride rock
12FV
