An outback station - leather-coloured hills wigged over with scrub and bush where in summer just above the ground vision wavers - that violent collision of the sun's power faced with its own reflection. Far-seeing eyes look to the sky finding relief in colours blue or weather's break or just the pretty pattern of some shredded clouds. In the homestead she crochets the clouds cirrus' feathered doilies the irregular braille of cirrocumulous for a bed cover a dramatic cumulonimbus buildup for a winter scarf. Sixty years find her dextered fingers bent to needle even when at rest. And then, at last, a chance trip to the sea - whiter sands edged in Prussian blue and - in the damp dark sand between - Nature deposits its perfect lace shyly at her feet such exquisite and fleeting detail. Her tears flow hot in the salty breeze, grazing paths in her threadbare cheeks. She cries at the easy fling and careless suck of waves; at the beauty arrived and erased; at her tired, tired hands and the myriad lace masterpieces she'll never have time to design.
A Story
Published
Out of the Cave 