THE GARDEN                               Sydney, May 1985

Where fires have raged,

where droughts have desiccated the land,

where floods have washed away all hope,

with sun beating down to crack the earth :

in this desert, a garden has been planted

with every variety of tree, with palm and pine;

fruits of every kind, pomegranate and mango;

and blossoms of orange, prunus and frangipani –

and here we walk, my friend, in a garden of delights.

THE ANTIPODES                     Sydney, Bondi Beach, May, 1985

Setting sail from rotten hulks ,

driven by winds roaring in the dark,

far from familiar faces and comforting fields,

shamed, uncertain, at the ends of the earth,

now we have reached, my lovely one, the other shore,

a desert of delights, cooled by the ocean,

warmed by a sun high and magnificent.

Here we stand, untrammeled,

living from ourselves, outside of time, in a strange new Eden.