Paul Williamson: Winter Break

Winter Break

Briefly unencumbered we travel to warmth
on a lazy island in the Keppel Group
close to Yeppoon, on the coast near Rockhampton.
Our small boat churns across the turquoise swell.

A heavy rust-encrusted chain waits as mooring
on a beach of white coral pieces, grey pebbles and sand.
Pandanus nuts carpet the ground.
Coconuts drop from trees and sprout warning signs.
Brush thick-knees, the local curlews, stand like statues
outside huts while a sacred kingfisher darts
from a tree to glean insects.
An osprey claims the nearby craggy peak
to scan the ocean for prey as the sea eagle glides.

The eco huts are off the grid but lack little
with small wind-power, solar panels, rain-water
gas for cooking and a nightly log fire near the beach.
Swimmers snorkel blue coral patches
near where small oysters clad underwater rock faces
and polkadot the shallow shoreline.
Others fish the deep pools near rocky points
or paddle-board and kayak to mangroves
the bay protects from summer cyclones.

Woppaburra seafaring people lived here
but were officially removed a hundred years ago.
Now from hills of rust-stained hard sandstone
folded and baked by volcanic plugs
holiday-makers watch for humpback whales.
Mercurial weather blows from the Pacific.
Windy then not; cloudy then fine.
Ten degrees warmer than freezing southern home
it’s hard to leave this winter.

Paul Williamson