Paul J Penton – Songwriter

We’d see them every now and then,the squeaking pedals of our bikes would pause as we looked at one that was sitting on the path. We’d find a spindly stick and start prodding the thing.  You could see its oily wart infested skin waiting to throw toxins at you, slimey creatures that would the hop off into the undergrowth that reaked of rotting vegetation. No fresh fields of mown grass here, just a  dense thicket of confused branches beyond the ditch  a veil of mystery it would be easy to lose a 7 year old child in.

One time as we rode we found a relative of the toad the plain old frog – it had  a stick coming up out of its mouth – how it got there we don’t know but I remember that in an act of kindness we tried to remove it ; The internal organs of the creature slid out like the change in a cash register- scarily we stuffed them back in and let the creature get on with whatever life it had left- it still makes me turn inside out when I think about it….

The cupboard is full of them, sealed hermetically tight. When the pantry door swings open, they’re all upright as if they’re a football crowd caught in freeze frame, as if some projectile or word of abuse about the umpire is about to spew forth. All done out in their team colours, Tunas stacked up in Safcol blue, baked beans outfitted in Heinz orange, rows of them. Stacks. Are we expecting a nuclear explosion or something? There’s so many of them. Perhaps while we’re not looking they breed. Perhaps they thrive on the darkness behind the closed door. Secret compartments at the bottoms of the cans suck in the darkness, lick it and taste it and use its ‘nothingness’ to produce more produce….This may explain the proliferation .

There seems to be something new each time the door swings open.. and I certainly haven’t indulged in anything down at those supermarket lanes – what happens down there I wonder? With 24 hour trading it would be hard for them to reproduce without being seen, security cameras ticking over recording every move. Security checks on camera ‘B’ would possibly ward them off. There’s a lot more opportunity for inter-breeding here – the brands compete for space and possibly the attention of each other- one could almost call it a ‘meat market’ but not every can contains meat. There’s an armoury of cans from every avenue of consumerism at the ‘mart’. They’re soldiers lined up on parade, arms stiffly at their sides, they and their respective adverts whisper and then play at full volume in my head – while the back ground music comes over with the generic supermarket slogan – ‘we are, we are’, all subtle psychological tricks played by the chain and by the cans themselves – is there really a can conspiracy? Do they own the supermarkets?

At a distance but close, leaning in but eyes are slightly closed, a bomb shield is raised up to prevent harm or injury. Don’t want to say too much don’t want to say too little.  Scales juggle in my mind, weighing and balancing outcomes and probabilities. The consequence of failure and the consequence of success. Success might lead to a commitment – am I ready? Does that thought make me want to run to the end of Patagonia? Failure might well be as bad as being crushed by an 18 wheeler going by.

Numbers, facts and figures spin like a one armed bandit. It’s a game of chance  playing out before me. There’s nothing to grab hold of, nothing clear. The view is opaque like driving through squalling rain with the window wipers up full, must slow down, tyres seem to be hovering over the road – aqua planing , out of control. The steering wheel ineffectual in hands that dig in like bird claws. As if the steering wheel were the last branch on earth. Why didn’t the weather report tell me? Did I listen to the weather report? No I did not take that ‘pre-caution’. Fear and anxiety are choking me with cinders from the bottom of a fire grate. The rain is a hissing demon, clattering on the cage of the car roof, almost deafening. Wipers scream back and forth, struggling to push the deluge away. Slower and slower now down to a precautionary fifty on a freeway that should be running at a hundred

Like a science laboratory jars sit inside the arctic refrigerator, their rainbows of colour brightening the dim interior. Placed on the kitchen table they remind her of experiments in school science class – passing around jars with the preserved fetuses of rabbits and rats and other long forgotten creatures.  The toes of a capsicum are curled up and sleeping. The head of a tomato seems to wink. An artichoke begs to have its hair combed.

She fishes about in the cupboard next to the sink for a platter and it rings a plastic echo through the high walls of the kitchen. she’s a bit too strong with the lid of the sun dried tomatoes and it flies through the air landing on the tiled floor with a metallic ting which circles the room as it sets itself out flat.  The red juicy half smiles of the tomatoes are arranged on the left. Olive oil drips in slow motion from them and coats her fingers as she arranges them.  She tastes one to make sure they haven’t gone off. They’ve been there so long now she does wonder. A slightly peppery taste is still pleasant as she fills in the spaces with other preserved vegetables and adorns another plate with fresh sliced bread….

Saturday night and a helicopter is yawning around in the sky. The engine rising and falling in pitch as it goes past, proving the Doppler effect. A thick searchlight beam lighthouses its way across dull suburban roofs that have gone to sleep for the night already. On the ground pristine police vehicles with patchwork blue squares scurry like ants along haunted laneways and back streets searching for a suspect. The chase is on. Sniffer dog radio systems relay the scent from car to car, last known sighting current believed whereabouts.

A pair  of officers emerge from a vehicle in a cobbled 1890’s laneway. Pistols hanging like warts from their belts. Shod with service issue boots they clop along edges of leaning corrugated iron fences and overhanging bushes, poised to reach for weapons. Overhead the chopper hangs in the firmament with a deafening whir. Neighbours emerge from front doors and into empty back yards to see what might be going on. The suspect jumps a fence and is running down the  cobblestones. Officer one reaches for a pistol. It’s grainy handle reassuring in hand. The training kicks automatically and he calls for the man to halt with no response. A shot fires. The recoil kicks the officer’s hand upward and he steadies again with the other arm……

Food trolleys wheeled down aisles -  the smell of airline food, portions of roast beef and braised chicken and pastas and potatoes. The tinkle of the miniatures drinks bottles and then the film. The projector is set up in our section  the reels clattering away and the sound arriving at our ears via audio pipes , not electronics- real sound piped into our seats!.

The child does not sleep and sees mysterious towers of flame, first one then another and soon a small constellation of flames illuminating there surrounds – later discovering these are oil wells in the gulf of Arabia. Sun comes around again too quick, now from the window seat behind the engine the inquisitive child asks why black bits keep flying our out the engine. Later to discover this is normal. But mother is slightly scared witless by this discovery – confirmed as ‘normal’ by the big brother aeronautical engineer.

Kuala Lumpur, flat bedded busses rush out like a herd of elephants to capture us as we alight into pressing humidity, unknown humidity. Whisked to the terminal where a bazaar of sellers purloin their goods. Sandalwood elephants are bought for ‘two kangaroo dollars’. Their tusks later to drop out and be lost in the swamp of time.  Elephants in a beautiful shade of polished sandstone. Back to the jet in the flat bed busses, jet fuel in the air so thick you could start a petrol station. Resume the window seat. Watching the ground drop away and becoming weightless. Sucking on a sweet barley sugar to make your ears pop. Only another 8 hours to Australia now, not long to go.

Panic surges, or is it adrenaline, the knowledge that action must be taken immediately- or the potential of extinction is a reality. Choking, stuck, a log in your pipes a log in your eye, remove it and you’ll see clearly – bible verses, hanging with the fundies in 1988. Tasting the sweet juice of belief and salvation, putting them on a sandwich of words from the good book. Believing those sweet raspberry jam words, trying to remove the log in my eye – why didn’t I notice it before? Before I was illumined. If only this thing stuck in my throat was so easy to remove.

Starting to get really grey now, rushing trying to find someone to perform the Heimlich manouvre. Just get this satellite of space junk out of the inner space of my wind pipe. Could I try Karate chops on my Adam’s apple, anything? This utter failure of the conveyor belt to my stomach now has me super flustered I’m a  blowfly trying to fly through a window, my head just keeps hitting it. I can see the world outside, but there’s this barrier, and things are getting heavier and heavier, lead weights hanging from my eyelids.

Last resort I stick my fingers down my throat, they’re large and sandpapery. They make me gag . That reaching feeling where my insides are being turned out like a pair of kitchen gloves that are a little too tight, they come off with insides showing. Bark, snap, barf….the release of stuff clears my glotis and a mess of vegetables and pieces of food in varying states of decay fly toward the kitchen floor, but  I can breathe now! Hallelujah I can breathe – feels good, deep breaths, deep sobbing breaths and gasps as tension ratchets down, anxiety now off red and the dial on yellow and falling….