Tasman Dreams of Yesterday

Dreaming again of a train track ending at the edge of the sea (Big black cloud was low and rolling our way) Dog at the barbed wire barking at birds in the kauri trees (Sound of a switchblade shining in the summer rain) No one on the corner had a quarter for the telephone Everybody bitching, “were walkin through world alone.” Dreaming again of the ninety mile beach and the white sand gulls (Chattering boys, writing on the Reinga Lighthouse walls) All of us lost at the cross street waiting for the other to go (Didn’t find a friend but, boy, I really bought a lot) Someone bet a dollar that my daddy wasn’t coming home Everybody bitching, “The rain will never leave us alone.” Dreaming again that its freezing and my mother’s in her flowerbed (Long dead rows of daffodils and marigolds) Changing her face like a shadow on the gravel, this is what she said, (Blood on my chin, still chewing on a red rose) “No one lives forever and the devil never sleeps alone” Everybody bitching, “There’s nothing on the radio”