The Gun Shop; The Gods

The Gun Shop

1953

Flipping through the catalogues,

he sometimes doubts his expertise.

He knows about the up-wind scents,

the stillness in the stalking,

the speed a wild boar has when charging.

He’s known from maybe ten or so

just how to drop a leaping rabbit

neatly from the air,

the way you have to “lead” them

depending on the breeze.

He’s done his time out on the range,

the .303s with pasted targets.

Perched here on a three-point stool

behind a length of counter,

he looks towards the door.

A steel mesh guards the window.

He’d like his own five hundred acres

to shoot on as he wishes

but mainly it’s for friends on Sundays—

wild pigs in a distant paddock,

rabbits breeding back.

Every station, every farm

needs to have some sort of rifle,

maybe just for acts of mercy,

the vagaries of bogs and birthing

or jobs half-done by dogs or dingoes.

Shotguns, too, are good for snakes.

The missus needs one in the cupboard.

He knows the categories by now,

the gauges, calibres and actions,

the honour roll of famous names:

the Remingtons and Winchesters,

the Browning .22s,

the good old .303 Lee Enfield

that won two wars hands down,

the Slazengers, the Brnos,

the Hornet with its lovely sting,

the different feel each polished stock

has against the cheek.

He likes the smell of cleaning oil,

the flannel and the pull-through;

he likes the energy of cordite

waiting in the shell.

It’s quiet all over town and yet

there is a tension here.

Every bullet, every cartridge

wears the autograph of death.

It’s what they’re all designed to write.

He’s seen the westerns at the Palace,

the weekend matinees,

the black hats and the white,

the lever-actions fired from saddles

but that’s not what he likes.

It’s more the power it brings—

a rabbit taken on the wing,

its eyes still glazing over,

the way you cast a taller shadow—

and, having had his own close-shaves,

he knows the even-handedness

of everything he sells.

He knows “don’t travel with it loaded”,

“don’t drag it backwards through a fence”,

“be careful who you’re hunting with”,

“beware the two-bob lair”.

He’s not so fussed on spotting roos,

searchlights in a drunken paddock,

blazing from a jeep.

It’s more the silence that he likes

and how a well-aimed single smack

can powerfully divide it.

He turns a page. This latest Hornet

could be just what he needs,

its smoothness up against the face,

the telescopic sights,

the workmanship, the famous name,

the way it sits there in the hands,

the fluency it promises

from shot to shot to shot.

The Gods

Vishnu & Lakshmi

10th–11th Century

Rajasthan or Uttar Pradesh

Sandstone

Now that I have been there briefly

this figurine makes much more sense,

Vishnu smiling next to Lakshmi,

both of them so damned content,

a happy merchant and his wife,

post-coital in undamaged stone.

Ten centuries have made it clear

that gods don’t like to be alone.

Meanwhile a carpet business thrives.

The tea-house aunts have done things well.

The gods smile at the Vaishya caste.

Lakshmi’s belly starts to swell.