Dreamtime Labyrinth

I am a journalist

(and I am)

I go to interview

A nature-based installation artist

(But I haven’t)

I pass paddocks of horses

(I have horses)

They nod their heads at me

In greeting.

I find the artist’s father

(My father is dead)

He says I will find her

Resting on an island

In the lake

Tired, I suppose,

From her placing

Of miniature pieces of wood

In oh so careful patterns.

I see her asleep

(I think – am I awake or dreaming?)

As I walk out

Through the shallow water

To visit her

Her legs quiver

And become the

Head of a large crocodile

(Couldn’t it have been a mermaid’s tail?)

With dozens of flared nostrils.

From the flared nostrils

Baby chicks and ducklings appear

Chittering and clucking

Snuggling up to their strange mother

Who is still asleep

I call to her

(I forget her name)

She sits up and looks at me

(And she is me)

The ‘we’ of us smile

At the strange ways

Of the dreamtime labyrinth.