Albert Holding
I came out here for a smoke
and to get away from the wife.
She’s been on and on about the pub,
the beer,
my mates and me getting drunk,
ever since the war.
War!
What does she know about it?
To blokes like Frank it meant starvation
and brutality beyond imagining.
He once told us, over a few beers too many,
that the lucky ones were those who died early.
The others came home to a life in the mines,
with nothing to look forward to but Friday arvo
and a mate at the bar who understands.
He’d wake up at night to thunder,
thinking he’s under attack
when it’s only rain on the roof.
I spent too long in the desert driving trucks
when I could have been beside Frank
and had the honour of getting beaten to a pulp
by some slit-eyed bastard with a skeleton grin.
Some blokes reckon I was one step away
from a white feather in the mail.
Cheetham had his excuse,
being deaf in one ear.
But all I got was some pea-brain army doctor
scrawling ‘not for the frontline’ on my report.
When I pushed the white ant for an answer,
and stood close enough
for him to count my nose hairs,
he had the hide to say,
‘It’s not only the body that has to be fit, Holding.’
I almost slugged him, then and there,
but they had military police
stationed outside his door.
He’d been punched a few times before
by the look of him.
Cheetham and me wandered around in a daze
for a week
until they stationed us in the Alice,
a million bloody miles from Frank and our mates.
When I got home
I thought the wife would understand
and wouldn’t nag me
about going back down the mine,
where the enemy is a thousand tons of dirt
held up by timber studs and a few nails and bolts.
After the war I was going to make up for lost time.
But the time I spent away,
it’s still lost.
No matter what I do,
it stays lost.
I pull hard on my durry
and watch the heavy clouds roll in.
It’s going to rain for Colleen’s funeral.
As it should.
At least that’ll keep my wife quiet,
for an hour or two.
After the funeral.
That’s when I’ll make my move.
If Grainger can’t put two and two together
then I’ll do it for him.
No one in this town will think of me as gutless.
Not this time.
Eddie
The Catholic church is full to bursting
with every pew taken
and people crowded along the walls
and at the back.
They shut the mine for a shift
and the shops are all closed.
The school has a day off
and we’re spending it here with Colleen,
her coffin near the altar,
with a photo on top.
Her long blonde hair
shines from behind the glass
and I can hear Mrs O’Connor
crying in the front pew.
I’m wearing Dad’s army boots,
polished with spit and rags,
because my feet are too big for my good shoes
and Dad said we weren’t buying new ones,
not for a funeral.
Sally and me are sitting close,
listening to the priest
talk about God calling his children home,
welcoming them to his side,
asking us to pray for those lost
and those reunited.
I close my eyes
and imagine the river at Taylors Bend.
A bunch of us from school
went there one afternoon to swim.
Colleen sat on the wild grass beside the bank
and laughed as I dive-bombed from the tree
and nearly flooded the beach.
The priest asks us to stand
and hold hands to give us strength.
He prays that peace be with us
and I’m pleased to feel Sally’s warmth
and look into her sad eyes.
We sit down again and I glance around.
My family are in the pew opposite.
Larry is looking at the altar.
Mum is clenching her hands tight in her lap
and Dad stares straight ahead,
not a muscle moving.
Mr Carter is sitting near the front.
His paper said Colleen was a ray of sunshine
that bathed our town in a glow,
bright enough to stay with us for ever.
When this is all over,
I’ll thank him for honouring Colleen.
The priest calls us to sing
but all I hear is the sound of hard rain
falling on my empty town.
Albert Holding
Christ almighty!
I
I came out here for a smoke
and to get away from the wife.
She’s been on and on about the pub,
the beer,
my mates and me getting drunk,
ever since the war.
War!
What does she know about it?
To blokes like Frank it meant starvation
and brutality beyond imagining.
He once told us, over a few beers too many,
that the lucky ones were those who died early.
The others came home to a life in the mines,
with nothing to look forward to but Friday arvo
and a mate at the bar who understands.
He’d wake up at night to thunder,
thinking he’s under attack
when it’s only rain on the roof.
I spent too long in the desert driving trucks
when I could have been beside Frank
and had the honour of getting beaten to a pulp
by some slit-eyed bastard with a skeleton grin.
Some blokes reckon I was one step away
from a white feather in the mail.
Cheetham had his excuse,
being deaf in one ear.
But all I got was some pea-brain army doctor
scrawling ‘not for the frontline’ on my report.
When I pushed the white ant for an answer,
and stood close enough
for him to count my nose hairs,
he had the hide to say,
‘It’s not only the body that has to be fit, Holding.’
I almost slugged him, then and there,
but they had military police
stationed outside his door.
He’d been punched a few times before
by the look of him.
Cheetham and me wandered around in a daze
for a week
until they stationed us in the Alice,
a million bloody miles from Frank and our mates.
When I got home
I thought the wife would understand
and wouldn’t nag me
about going back down the mine,
where the enemy is a thousand tons of dirt
held up by timber studs and a few nails and bolts.
After the war I was going to make up for lost time.
But the time I spent away,
it’s still lost.
No matter what I do,
it stays lost.
I pull hard on my durry
and watch the heavy clouds roll in.
It’s going to rain for Colleen’s funeral.
As it should.
At least that’ll keep my wife quiet,
for an hour or two.
After the funeral.
That’s when I’ll make my move.
If Grainger can’t put two and two together
then I’ll do it for him.
No one in this town will think of me as gutless.
Not this time.
Eddie
The Catholic church is full to bursting
with every pew taken
and people crowded along the walls
and at the back.
They shut the mine for a shift
and the shops are all closed.
The school has a day off
and we’re spending it here with Colleen,
her coffin near the altar,
with a photo on top.
Her long blonde hair
shines from behind the glass
and I can hear Mrs O’Connor
crying in the front pew.
I’m wearing Dad’s army boots,
polished with spit and rags,
because my feet are too big for my good shoes
and Dad said we weren’t buying new ones,
not for a funeral.
Sally and me are sitting close,
listening to the priest
talk about God calling his children home,
welcoming them to his side,
asking us to pray for those lost
and those reunited.
I close my eyes
and imagine the river at Taylors Bend.
A bunch of us from school
went there one afternoon to swim.
Colleen sat on the wild grass beside the bank
and laughed as I dive-bombed from the tree
and nearly flooded the beach.
The priest asks us to stand
and hold hands to give us strength.
He prays that peace be with us
and I’m pleased to feel Sally’s warmth
and look into her sad eyes.
We sit down again and I glance around.
My family are in the pew opposite.
Larry is looking at the altar.
Mum is clenching her hands tight in her lap
and Dad stares straight ahead,
not a muscle moving.
Mr Carter is sitting near the front.
His paper said Colleen was a ray of sunshine
that bathed our town in a glow,
bright enough to stay with us for ever.
When this is all over,
I’ll thank him for honouring Colleen.
The priest calls us to sing
but all I hear is the sound of hard rain
falling on my empty town.
Albert Holding
Christ almighty!
I
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