Volatile Spearwood

VOLATILE SPEARWOOD


A weapon vine?
a bendy spring
of a thing
that trails
across red rock's stone rooves
with viney roots below
crevasse and rock cavern
growing up and up with passive
long and bending yet woody
lithe laterals of
creeper canes

as if just
an isolated
another species
of the Wonga Vine
like that which flowers
in the southern spring
as does the Tecoma
back home

but this
is the true desert form,
"Pandorea doratoxylon"
and there's a secret weapon
in the name, a secret
which comes out
as from Pandora's box
with its surprise
in volatile weaponry

for such
vine-long
woody canes
will dry
strong and hard
and springy
and can be
straightened
well before
they set
so long
so hard
so dry

straightened
over the heat
of fires
of desert-wood
hot coals

straighten
like a long
vertibrae
a backbone
ready for
its flight

its deadly
flight, with
the hard-won
much-practised
skill of a
good hunter
who brings
home a kill

manufacture-
added with
a woomera's
dimple-notch
at launch-end

fitted with
the spearhead:
a hard sharp end
with a needle point,
and barbs,

whether shovel-nosed
or knife-ended

a hunting spear
strong enough
to kill
light enough
to fly far
and straight
enough to
bullseye in
on a vital place..

A spear is
a man's long arm
his longer arm

Spearwood
becomes his
lethal reach;
his volatile arm
of unbent
purpose.

*

In Yundum
As Darby called
Yuendumu, I found
such a spear...

a long held
warrior-made weapon,
which they said was
not to be sold

but Darby insisted
like a desert lord
and the spear
came off the shelf
and I paid.

*

I carried it through
Yuendumu like
a scud missile

a little embarrassed
to be caught
holding such nuclear-manufactured treasure
such a volatile warrior-piece

feeling it came
to me from legends
where the vine grew
in canny wisdom
and faith to the hunt
in living courage.

Since a boy
I have been
a hunter with
traps and guns

But us boys
often played
at being
Aborigines with
spears, as
if respecting
the call for
eye contact
with a quarry
or an enemy
which a spear
respects
and never
over-reaches.

So I have
it still.
Although I no
longer hunt,
but I have it
like I have a gun:
for the true regard.

For ownership
of a spear
calls up a
hunting eye,
a wary watch,
knowledge of grim
necessities
of the blood,
it upkeeps
a man's ear
for hunger's larger cure
and the weaponed man
understands why it
is God worked
up the grandeur
of carnivores
of keener ears
of sharper sight
of tooth and claw
that will defend
their own against
small regard
against petty
lives.

And yet I feel
a bit of a fraud
for my lack
of spearwood skill,

for a blossoming kill
is the spearwood's
volatile skill

the provision
that capped a man
as bringer of meat
to a cooking fire.