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Yarra even people don't know dear old Melbourne -sounds like 'over there' still I'm not the one to ask who had a sister living there for decades-and a step daughterliving there nw cheers P Ps did you swim across? -----Original Message----- From: Poetryetc: poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bill Wootton Sent: 30 October 2013 09:19 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: Slipping in (title tentative) Thanks, Pat. Thinking of changing title to Slipping into Belonging. What think you? Final line might escape meaning in your hemisphere. I schooled in Balwyn on the other side of the river from Ivanhoe where I lived. Bill > On 30 Oct 2013, at 6:48 pm, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > > Bill thanks lovely picture -memories P > > -----Original Message----- > From: Poetryetc: poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] > On Behalf Of Bill Wootton > Sent: 29 October 2013 20:21 > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Slipping in (title tentative) > > Slipping in > > Aware of being on the edge of change; > The Moon landing being slipped into British History as an example of > modern colonisation. > > Doing Geography projects in small groups, presenting finished product > on coloured A3 paper; negotiating up from being responsible for The > Heading. > > Ribbed long socks and pale yellow cotton girls' sports tunics; > Annette's wiry red hair and freckled arms clashing with all that > paleness. We boys trimming the bottom isosceles of our tan ties. > > Rock Lunch Club: voluntarily opting to sit at desks after The Bell, > egg sangos and fruitcake splayed from brown bags; Cocker Happy > jaunting on the school's stereo, wall-mounted Wharfedale speakers. > > Double desking with Felicity in Pure, > while chalked formulae accumulated on the smooth blackboard. > Waiting for her thigh to shift; the times she allowed nestle. > > Frosty mornings, slinging my Malvern Star up, front wheel latching > between spokes on the high hook in the Bike Shelter. > Mouse's inert red 500cc Suzuki gleaming below its pedal cousins. > > Room 32, the dour Test Room, in its own isolated block, sometimes > doubling as a drama room; pretending to not care when my part in a > play was rotated to Jovan, who later died in a car accident. > > Noticing my hand being the only one up, responding to a question about > The Merchant of Venice, the penny > dropping: the maths/science elites really didn?t know. > > Mrs Sikh who wrote maths solutions with both hands on the board at the > same time, not to show off but because she found it efficient; Mr > Bodley, insisting post-PE shower doors remain propped open. > > Muffled laughter in the Breezeway, from behind cupped hands: > catching the word 'period', clearly not denoting subject session, > knowing there was stuff I didn't know and couldn't ask about. > > Tough Macca dropping dead after an inter-school footy game. > Guest speaker Danny Spooner singing 'The Famous Flower of Serving Men' > a cappella; the hush in the hall at the tale of portents and transformations. > > Collecting signatures on a petition for which I wrote the preamble, > proposing a Form Six student smoking room in the Physics lab; posting > it in the mail in a stamped envelope to squeaky-voiced Principal Perry. > > Summoned to 'Head' office as number one signatory, being treated > warily, respectfully, by someone in power for the first time. > Permission denied; a watch put on me. > > Ned Wilson Beatling his straight hair vertically over his forehead, > running the black comb teeth the full width of his head just above eye > level, never taking eyes off his image in the long mirror in the boys' toilet. > > Hearing instructions in French over the PA for a senior class; > ignoring other bulletins over the PA, not even knowing that The > Pirates of Penzance was a musical, for the whole of 1968. > > Failing woodwork in form two and my father a carpenter; Pop Quizzes in > Science trotted out by a rotund American; matching terms with precise > definitions his brainwave. > > Reversed polarities in steeply tiered Room 15, desks perched on > scaffolding-supported floorboards, designed for cooking > demonstrations, enabling looking down on vulnerable teacher. > > The rumbling of pulled down continuous cloth ?blackboards? > to expose virgin dark green - or remnants of an unscrubbed lesson. > Yardstick rulers resting on the wall, outsized wooden protractors. > > Feeling woozy in metalwork room; each boy at lesson's end, standing to > attention by his vice, silent, stared down by grey dust-coated Mr > Mir's chocolate eyes above wiry black-grey moustache. > > The wooden seat of my chair coming adrift, thwacking to the floor as > we inverted them in unison at day's end in Art, laughter; accepted for > the first time on the other side of the Yarra. > > bw > 30.10.13= >