Portrait of Departure

Abstract

Portrait of Departure Paul Mitchell (bio) Elderly couple (Sussex Street, Yarraville) Carried from a neatly clipped gardenlike sleeping children from a partyasleep until bodies that held themwarm new beds, nodding one last timeat their brick veneer, Greek columnscreaking plum tree, aged fruit oddly ripened. A windless autumn day at dusk, radiotalks back, but its problems are ludicrous.Lawns are watered, mown and edgedit's cuppa tea time in silence that can only beconversation. Green shade cloth screenstheir house, but they're carried to wheregreen shade cloth's not required. They laughat the memory of green shade cloth, it takesthe shape of a belly dancer, spiraling to the beatof talkback radio, her shimmied scarfdraped upon their necks makes neither blushbut drags them from directors' chairsfor a vigorous gardening session.They're carried when they're readyand not before. By a warm soft palm caressand a whisper from a cherubim statue:It's time to go where you've always been. [End Page 40] Paul Mitchell Paul Mitchell is a Melbourne-based writer who has published five books, including a novel, We. Are. Family. (MidnightSun Publishing, 2016) and three collections of poems. He has judged the Victorian Premier's Award for poetry, and his most recent poetry collection, Standard Variation (Walleah Press, 2014), was short-listed for the 2016 Adelaide Writers' Week John Bray Poetry Prize. Copyright © 2020 Wayne State University Press