a grass tree by any other name

Flora and fauna have taken over the apartment.
We come together spreading like wildfire, like rain.
Not the country we had hoped–three flights high
On stolen land–but it’s our slow-growing peace
For when we tire of the Australian Dreamtime.
A place we can hang our emu feather earrings,
Wash ochres from each other’s skin, leave our keys
In a coolamon carved from the knee of a river red,
Without white superstition or political subtext.
Spectacles recede into the chirping suburban buzz
And flushed by an ancient patience, green thumb,
I watch your hedge magic season our landscape
In wetness opalescent as crocodile tears. Almost
Lyrical the way you spin leaf and afternoon light.
A ceremony taking your time tending the grass
Tree, potted knee-high, stump burnt black, stem
Sun-soaked and sprouting past our heads, flowering
Names we keep a secret. This bush-love sacred.