Focus

I’ll forget more than remember
sitting out there on those white chairs
with you – I think it was you –
now I ask the garden to look

and I’m grateful for the quality,
rows of flowers, you visiting
every week for such a long time,
how we and the grass grew.

I’d pass a note, some tea,
thoughts and if you were about to cry
I’d know. ‘You don’t have to stay’
seems worth scribbling… a call

from behind me, it’s the dog,
she also knows something’s wrong
does she see watercolour in my eyes
can she tell I am slipping?

There’s something about your skirt
the lace helps me recall
who I am and have been
who I can’t seem to find anymore

There’s a photo in your hand
of a man in the world
I can’t even touch this person
humbled as I am by your love

which even you know is losing focus.
I don’t blame you, I thank you
the garden doesn’t care
there’s still something beautiful in the air.

We’re both just old stories waving
and I need to take a break.
I’m not sure why exactly
it just seems to feel that way.

T.A.R. Wallace is a yoga therapist and disability support worker living in Victoria’s regional centre of Bendigo. He has had his poems published in various journals and newspapers here and in the US, including in ‘Meanjin’ and ‘The Age’. He was the winner of the Lane Cove Literary Awards Poetry Prize in 2023, and has been editing a collection of children’s stories.

Readers’ original and unpublished poems of up to 40 lines can be emailed, with postal address, to [email protected]. Submissions should be in the body of the email, not as attachments. A poetry book will be awarded to each accepted contributor.