The Simple Gift

by Steven Herrick

  Steven Herrick was born in Brisbane, the youngest of seven children. At school his favourite subject was soccer, and he dreamed of football glory while he worked at various jobs. For the past thirty years he’s been a full-time writer and regularly performs his work in schools throughout the world. Steven lives in the Blue Mountains with his partner Cathie, a belly dance teacher. They have two adult sons, Jack

  and Joe.

  www.stevenherrick.com.au

  Also by Steven Herrick

  Young Adult

  A place like this

  Black painted fingernails

  By the river

  Cold skin

  Lonesome howl

  Love, ghosts and nose hair

  Slice

  Water bombs

  Children

  Do-wrong Ron

  Love poems and leg-spinners

  My life, my love, my lasagne

  Naked bunyip dancing

  Poetry to the rescue

  Pookie Aleera is not my boyfriend

  Rhyming boy

  The place where the planes take off

  Tom Jones saves the world

  Untangling spaghetti

  to my dad, in memory,

  to my mum, who always

  welcomed me back.

  Champagne

  It’s the only time my schoolbag

  has come in handy.

  I tip my books, pens, jumper

  out on my bed,

  shake yesterday’s sandwich, squashed,

  from the bottom of the bag.

  I go to the kitchen,

  take the beer,

  last night’s leftovers,

  some glossy red apples,

  Dad’s champagne and cigarettes,

  load my schoolbag,

  my travelling bag,

  leave the bottle of lemonade on the table

  with a note,

  ‘See ya Dad.

  I’ve taken the alcohol.

  Drink this instead

  to celebrate your son

  leaving home.’

  The old bastard will have a fit!

  And me?

  I’ll be long gone.

  Kiss the dog

  I’m not proud.

  I’m sixteen, and soon

  to be homeless.

  I sit on the veranda

  and watch the cold rain fall.

  Bunkbrain, our dog,

  sits beside me.

  I’d like to take him with me.

  He doesn’t deserve to stay

  in this dump, no-one does.

  But you don’t get rides

  with a dog.

  And two mouths to feed

  is one too many.

  Bunkbrain knows something,

  he nuzzles in close,

  his nose wet and dirty

  from sniffing for long-lost bones.

  I scratch behind his ears

  and kiss the soft hair

  on his head.

  I’ll miss you dog.

  I’m not proud.

  I’m leaving.

  The rain falls steady.

  Bunkbrain stays on the veranda.

  Longlands Road

  This place has never looked

  so rundown and beat.

  Old Basten’s truck still on blocks,

  the grass unmown around the doors.

  Mrs Johnston’s mailbox on the ground

  after I took to it with a cricket bat

  last week.

  And the windows to the Spencer house

  still broken

  from New Year’s Eve,

  it must get cold in the front room

  at night.

  My street.

  My suburb.

  I take a handful of rocks,

  golf ball size.

  I walk slowly in the rain

  the bag on my back.

  I throw one rock on the roof

  of each deadbeat no-hoper

  shithole lonely downtrodden house

  in Longlands Road, Nowheresville.

  The rocks bounce and clatter

  and roll and protest

  at being left in this damn place.

  I say goodbye to all that,

  throwing rocks down Longlands Road.

  Wentworth High School

  I reach school at four-thirty

  in the rainy afternoon

  of my goodbyes.

  Principal Viera’s Holden

  pulls out of the car park

  and blows smoke down the road.

  I jump the fence

  and walk the grounds.

  The wind howls and rain sheets in

  blowing potato crisp wrappers

  across the oval.

  I go to Room 421

  and look through the window.

  Mr Cheetam’s homework is on the board.

  Twenty-six students are learning

  about the geography of Japan

  and one lucky bastard is writing

  ‘may you all get

  well and truly stuffed’

  on the window

  in K-Mart red lipstick

  stolen especially for this occasion.

  I sign my name in red

  ‘Billy Luckett,

  rhymes with …’

  Let Cheetam chew on that.

  Westfield Creek

  I love this place.

  I love the flow of cold clear water

  over the rocks

  and the wattles on the bank

  and the lizards sunbaking,

  heads up, listening,

  and the birds,

  hundreds of them,

  silver-eyes and currawongs,

  kookaburras laughing

  at us kids swinging on the rope

  and dropping into the bracing flow.

  I spent half my school days here

  reading books I’d stolen

  from Megalong Bookshop

  with old Tom Whitton

  thinking I’m his best customer

  buying one book

  with three others shoved up my jumper.

  I failed every Year 10 subject

  except English.

  I can read.

  I can dream.

  I know about the world.

  I learnt all I need to know

  in books on the banks

  of Westfield Creek,

  my favourite classroom.

  Please

  The Great Western Highway

  is not much of a highway,

  not great at all,

  but it does head west,

  which is where I’m going

  if one of these damn cars

  will only stop and give me a ride.

  Two hours in the dark

  in the rain

  in the dirt of this bloody road

  is not getting me anywhere.

  What to do?

  Go home?

  ‘Say Dad,

  I still want to leave

  but I couldn’t get a lift

  so one more night

  that’s OK with you, isn’t it?’

  He’d be sober because I stole

  his beer

  his champagne.

>   No. I can’t go back.

  I could sleep at school,

  on the veranda.

  One more hour of this,

  just one ride,

  please.

  Freight train

  Not one car has passed

  in the last twenty minutes.

  At least the rain has stopped.

  I’m sitting on my bag

  looking across at the freight train

  stopped at the crossing

  for no good reason.

  Fifty coal carriages,

  empty,

  heading to the Waggawang Coalfields

  and one carriage

  with a speedboat strapped on top.

  A speedboat on a train

  heading west?

  To what?

  A coalfield lake?

  The inland river system

  dry as a dead dingo’s bones?

  And then it hits me.

  Who cares. It’s heading west,

  and I’m not …

  so …

  I race across the highway,

  bag swinging,

  and the train whistle blows

  as I reach the bushes beside the track,

  a quick glance, both ways,

  and I’m up on the carriage

  pulling myself into the

  Aquadream Speedboat

  with the soft padded bench seat,

  the Evinrude outboard motor

  and the fishing gear.

  The train whistle blows again

  and we lurch forward

  as I get my ride

  on a speedboat out of town

  and not a lake for miles.

  Cold

  Two kilometres down the track

  I realise

  how fast trains go

  when you’ve got no window to close

  and the wind and rain

  hits you in the face

  with the force of a father’s punch.

  I unpack my bag

  put my jacket on

  wrap a jumper around my ears and neck

  put my spare pants on

  over my trousers

  and I’m still freezing

  and the whistle keeps blowing

  as we speed through the bitter night.

  I’ll be frozen dead

  before morning.

  I snuggle under the bow

  of this speeding speedboat

  cutting the night

  my knees tight against my chest

  and my teeth clenched

  in some wild frost-bitten grin

  and that train whistle keeps me sane

  blowing across every dirt road crossing

  with flashing red lights

  and not a soul awake

  except the train driver

  warm in his cabin

  and the idiot

  hunched under the bow

  praying for morning and sunshine.

  Keep warm

  ‘Hey kid,

  get outta there.

  You’ll freeze to death.

  That’ll teach you

  to hitch a ride with National Rail.

  No free rides with this government, son.

  Just kidding.

  I hate the bloody government.

  Get your bag

  and come back to the guard’s van.

  There’s a heater that works,

  and some coffee.

  We’ve stopped here

  waiting for the Interstate.

  Passengers snoring in their comfy cabins

  get priority

  over empty coal trains.

  Say, what do you think of me boat?

  Yep, mine.

  I got a special deal to bring it home.

  We’ve got a lake outside of town,

  perfect for fishing

  and getting away from the telly.

  I’m going to sit in this tub

  and drink myself stupid

  every weekend.

  There you go.

  Make a cuppa if you want.

  And here’s some sandwiches,

  too much salad for my liking.

  Just don’t tell anyone about this, OK.

  I’ll see you in the morning.

  We’ll be in Bendarat at dawn.

  I’ll blow the whistle three times

  and I’ll stop just before town.

  Jump out then, OK.

  Keep warm.

  I’ve got a train to drive.’

  Men

  There are men like Ernie,

  the train driver, in this world.

  Men who don’t boss you around

  and don’t ask prying questions

  and don’t get bitter

  at anyone different from them.

  Men who share a drink and food

  and a warm cabin

  when they don’t have to.

  Men who know the value of things

  like an old boat

  built for long weekends on a lake.

  Men who see something happening

  and know if it’s right

  or wrong

  and aren’t afraid to make that call.

  There are men like Ernie

  and

  there are other men,

  men like my dad.

  Sport

  I was ten years old

  in the backyard

  kicking a soccer ball

  against the bedroom wall,

  practising for the weekend.

  My first season of sport

  and I’d already scored a goal,

  so I kept practising, alone.

  And I guess I tried too hard,

  I kicked it too high,

  stupid of me I know,

  and I broke the bedroom window.

  I stood in the yard

  holding the ball

  looking at the crack in the pane.

  Dad came thundering out.

  He didn’t look at the damage.

  He’d heard it.

  He came over, grabbed the ball,

  kicked it over the back fence

  into the bushes,

  gave me one hard backhander

  across the face,

  so hard I fell down

  as much in shock as anything,

  and I felt the blood

  from my nose,

  I could taste it dribbling out

  as Dad stood over me

  and said

  no more sport

  no more forever.

  He walked back inside

  and slammed the door

  on my sporting childhood

  that disappeared into the bushes

  with my soccer ball.

  I was ten years old.

  I didn’t go inside for hours.

  I looked through the back window

  watching him

  reading the paper

  in front of the television

  as if nothing

  had happened.

  Another crossing

  Ernie was right,

  too much salad in the sandwich,

  but I ate it all the same.

  I had a coffee

  heaped with sugar

  sweet and hot

  and I felt warm

  like Ernie had wished.

  I took the champagne

  out of my bag

  and stood it on the
table

  between Ernie’s coffee pot

  and his lunch box.

  I wrote a note.

  ‘Thanks Ernie.

  Here’s a present

  to launch your boat.

  Don’t smash it though!

  Drink it.’

  I heard the whistle again

  and looked out at

  another lonesome crossing

  and felt glad

  that the champagne

  was going to someone

  who deserved it.

  Bendarat

  Dawn is fog-closed and cold.

  A ute bounces along the dirt road

  beside the track,

  its lights dancing in the mist.

  I see a street sign,

  ‘Bendarat – five kilometres’.

  I pack my bag quickly,

  warm my hands

  close to the heater

  and wait for the three whistles

  to dump me in another State,

  miles from home

  miles from school,

  with the sun finally

  lifting the fog

  as the train slows

  and Ernie whistles good luck.

  I climb down,

  wave ahead,

  and walk slowly

  into Bendarat.

  Tonight, and the night after

  The walk stretches my cold body

  and gets me breathing again.

  As I near town there’s more cars

  and school buses, yellow,

  full of kids shouting insults

  at me, the bum,

  walking down the road.

  I don’t care,

  better a bum than a schoolkid.

  It’s an old town

  with stone buildings

  and wide streets

  and cast-iron street lamps

  like crazy ghosts lurking

  on the footpaths.

  And every shop has a SALE sign

  like the whole town’s

  desperate for money.

  As I walk down Main Street

  thinking of the $50 in my pocket

  and how it’s got to last me

  a lifetime

  I realise Bendarat

  is not the only desperate one.

  But, today

  I don’t care.

  The sun is shining now