IMAGES

 

IMAGES ...  Maureen Clifford ©  The #ScribblyBarkPoet

Are they being mustered silently beneath a silver moon

by dogs long gone?  Only their ghosts remain.

The thrumming canter of a thousand sheep upon the move

unseen by us, are heard crossing the  plain.

Faintly you hear the sharp crack of a bullwhip in the night

as long departed stockmen move the  flock,

and hear the bridle’s jingle and the creak of leather old.

Are spirit horses pushing up the stock?

 

Could these paddocks tell a story?  Well that would be a fair bet -

they’d tell of sparse treed hills and dusty plains

where many stock have perished from the fires, and droughts and floods,

  their bones now ground to dust, all that  remains.

The bones of working dogs are here.  Miss Jess and Ralph and Sam,

 as well as Blacky.  All those gone before.

 The image is not hard to see when at night they all rise

all keen to work the ovine flock once more.

 

It’s been sold again, this old place and it’s standing lonely still,

no warming fires reflection in the house.

The love that made this place a comfortable family home,

has gone –it’s over run with rat and mouse.

The ghosts of dogs are lonely, and no doubt they linger near,

they’ve never even once been known to roam.

They listen in the darkness and all cock a ghostly ear

for sounds to tell them they are not alone.

 

As those cold winds beat on rocky hillsides, flog the frosted plains,

  their ice-cold fingers beat on windows bare.

I think of ghostly animals still yearning for their home,

abandoned, left behind with none to care.

Recalling better times, my memory once more goes back,

and memories I have, they’ve not yet passed.

I recollect my much loved animals and see each face

all silent now and still beneath the grass.

 

I hear the muffled bark, the clank of harness.

I see the sheep now coming down the track.

These memories and many more I cherish.

All I have now - for there’s no going back.