John Foulcher: Two Poems

Your Own Words

For Jane

Your father

is a small, withered thing

in the hospital sheets.

He scavenges in his lungs for another breath, finds the husk of a breath.

Am I dying? he says.

Yes, Dad, you are. Your poor old body

is giving in.

The minutes click and grind

away talk,

the air convulses and no one knows anything.

It’s alright, Dad. You can go now.

And he does.

You hold your sisters

and they fold

into you. You call and let me know

it’s over, I can come.

Already, arrangements for the funeral

are stiffening up.

They’ve asked me to speak

and I will.

You will speak for everyone

but not your own words.

It’s alright, Dad. You can go now. You can go.

Her Brother is Dead

She has only now heard that her brother is dead. Her breath is falling about. He’s dead he can’t be he can’t be dead. Her husband holds her as if she is made of finely cut glass. He says practical things, and they go, into the week of clutching and silence. The funeral is out past Canowindra. Her family have filled the pews, the rest of us stand around outside like a lynch mob. When everyone is there, the service is sown to the trees and the sky. God arrives, fashionably late, but no one has much to say to him. He has his place among the prayers. Afterwards at the wake, he shuffles around like a divorcee. He does not stay long, there is the future to get on with. Later she texts us, saying To walk out of that church and see u all under that kurrajong tree meant the world to me. When she walked out of the church and stood beneath the portal cross, it was as if she were searching for her brother, as if he would be late for his own funeral. The cross should be sharpened, I thought, like a stake. It should go deep into the earth. How else, I thought, could it carry a man?

John Foulcher