The Witnesses
At first I think that they are someone else,
the blond woman and her fair-haired daughter —
it’s the car probably, a station wagon
pulling up on the grass, white like the teacher’s,
and the profile’s the same. But, no, they’ve found me,
driving in despite the gate’s nearly lack of sign
and washed-out entrance turn, and twenty yards
of scratching, noisy wattles.
Pretty soon I know what’s afoot or what’s likely to be,
greeting them on the edge of the verandah —
surprised to see them, but guessing everything
as I watch them walking up towards me
with the pamphlets. “It’s a beaut day,” she says.
“Yes,” I say, “ how’re you going.” “We haven’t
been out this way a while,” she says, “but we’re here
to talk about God’s message.” Just like that:
and me, I’m thinking how not to ask them in,
and of how many times this has occurred,
and how many seconds to close the door.
They stand there in the flooded morning light —
the woman with her opening lines, the daughter
glancing nervously at her, embarrassed
perhaps by the whole event — and me absorbed
not in what they say but in the fact they’re there.
I let her talk on after I buy The Tower.
She talks of her earlier life, what’s she’s found,
how she now trusts only in what she’s found,
how she’ll spread the word while the vehicle lasts —
there’ll be money to fix it when she needs it.
She talks of a convention down in Sydney.
All the while I watch her daughter looking on,
making the link which holds me, as I wonder
what’s gone wrong, and how many phases
this sixteen-year old’s been put through to date:
I can’t help but think of small town poverty,
a broken marriage and — guesswork this —
ex-commune life, aging, a late start. A
past’s dark stream flows in her new-shared faith.
The daughter waits as if the day is long.
Behind her, I’m watching the half-full dam,
a silver coin shining at birdless sky —
it’s so blue and bright, the first day like this
now that the heat’s over and there’s cold.
Listening, I find the woman’s motives too frail to break —
I scuff a plank and mention how the neighbours,
unemployed, stay at home, happy at how
talking outdoors has usually got some purpose.
There’s no clear way to tell the truth, or lie.
There’s no way to shut out clean winter light.
Martin Harrison from The Book of Bees