Native Cut Wood Deflects Colonial Hunger

Why “raspberry jam tree?” Acacia acuminata. Mungart.

The guilt of cut wood? Its smell, its bloody show?

And that colorist’s jam envy, the lust for ropes

of raspberry. Fence-posts sturdy and hardy

and doused in creosote: to stand alone

in Termitesville. The sweetness turns rust.

And burnt offerings unless dried right through —

say for a year on the pile. Hot as hell to fire.

Nothing comes cost-free, we hear — those layers

of its dozen years a demonstration in history

as accumulation. Collective survey of occupation:

the real corps de ballet, the shrubby scenery,

bulldozed on roadsides. Ring a Ring o’ Roses.

All those brandings. Emblem of our town

that would miss no more than our rates.

“High turnover” region. Think raspberry

jam on white damper, think coals of fires.

The meager shade for sheep and cattle

and the denial of “unproductive” animals.

Nuisances. Saw deep into rough bark,

showered in pollen. Unholy fires

at the end of winter; and all that premonition,

all those seeds with snow in their bellies,

snow that can’t fall from this faraway sky.

So overwhelmingly familiar to me.

No Old Country raspberry homesickness.

Just an inkling of anthocyanin pigments.

Why “raspberry jam tree?” Acacia acuminata. Mungart.