Selected poems
Family Business
There are fewer holiday makers
going down the highway to beaches in summer
or up to the snow in winter
as Black Summer, Covid surges then high inflation
bring thinner trade to the historic wool-farming town
with nineteenth century red brick for business
and wooden houses for living.
Shops have less stock on shelves.
Local sales still go out
to farms on the Great Dividing Range
a ground-down mountain range of low hills
covered with grass for grazing.
The bakery is clean and bright, service cheerful.
Mother waits at the counter while her daughter brews coffee.
Cooking is done out the back
to fill the cut-back menu
and maintain the family’s dream.
The business survives as well as most.
Recharge
Standing to face the sea
the dull green wash
then white stripes of growling surf
further out the deep blue
he watches and they calm him.
Shoreward, bees worry small blue flowers
in sand in front of low hard scrub.
Far behind, eucalypts green the escarpment;
as he gazes they calm him.
Turning he walks towards life
with its work and loved ones
to take up his part again.
Paul Williamson is an Australian poet. He has published poems in Australia, UK, US, Canada and Japan. His has seven collections including Edge of Southern Bright (Ginninderra Press, 2017) and A Hint of Eden (Ginninderra Press, 2021). He contributed to and participated in the release of the Canberra/Nara Twin City tanka poetry volume in Nara, Japan in late 2018.