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Debbie Robson

Bio: Debbie Robson lives in Lake Macquarie, NSW Australia. She is the author of Tomaree and Crossing Paths, and has performed in Sydney, the Blue Mountains and Newcastle. Her short fiction has been published in Typishly, Cabinet of Heed, Storgy and Secret Attic 2020 , and her poetry in Poached Hare, Women of Words 2016-2109, Not Very Quiet, Dodging the Rain, Sunspot Literary Journal and Blood Tree Literature.

COX’S RIVER

Earlier this six foot track was justa pamphlet and now I am walkingon the dashes between “d” and “f”on the Land’s Department map. Loose stones under my feet, the suncolouring the grey-green hillsideyellow as I walk where once,two men moved ahead with awheelbarrow, pick and shovelkeeping the way clear for me to track their slow retreating formsall the way to the Cox’s River.
Now in the afternoon light it isa chocolate box painting of pinksand, white rocks that seemstill wet from the artist’s brush.Perhaps he remains here, sittingby the scrub near the next hill.I applaud his work but needto walk across the stream and touchthe rocks to find them wet and hardnot shimmering in a haze of perpetuity.
The river, the hills, GibraltarSugarloaf stretch about me, an allencompassing canvas of one person’sevocation. But I can’t find the wayacross such a slippery stream whereeven the pines are losing their hold,roots revealed, gnarled after yearsof gentle undermining. Two sheepare stranded on moss, standing firmon their small island in the middleof the river, looking as lost as I feelin the past, the recondite and reality.

THESE GHOSTS

Thin palings of a picket fenceshimmer in the air sometimes.Is the church still there?or at least its permutations,Hymns echoing down the years. When the trees on the hillrearrange their branchesin a slight breeze, there is an emptiness despite densefoliage. A space that can’tbe crossed over or built upon. And in the shopping centresbricks and mortar rear up in the summer sun implacablebut underneath, somewhere are sandstone blocks, mud huts. Dig deep beneath our concreteoverlay and you will findthese ghosts, negatives in ourpositive world that once exposedcan never be reinstated. Onlyto be seen again in photographsor recalled by elderly memories.
Yet there is a ripple in the riverwhere the punt used to cross a hundred years ago. And trailingthe deep veranda the white petalsof a banksia rose glow paleagainst stories of towering glass.

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