Free Playing With Water by Kate Llewellyn Page B

her those at dinner
    in that old pink hotel by the lake
    like a farmer feeding Ratsack
    mixed with liver to a crow.
    But you have reckoned without me.
    You’ve announced in numerous legends
    you’ll not be leaving your wife
    I hope to God you don’t—
    ruin three lives, not four.
    I know you’re smitten,
    you only use seeds
    when you’ve spotted something
    you want and know you can’t
    otherwise have—and is half the age
    that you are. Yes, I admit
    she’s enjoying the darkness
    down there in your lair of secrets,
    dead birds and bones.
    But she’s a creature of light,
    of the sun, beaches.
    Your cold gloomy pool lit with forty-watt
    globes
    won’t satisfy her in the long run.
    She’ll want to come up to the light.
    I know you don’t care
    how much you’ve cost
    and what you have ruined and smashed.
    But read Birthday Letters and think.
    Do us all a favour, go hunting,
    let her go
    shoot a crow
    kill a stag
    be a man
    give her the antidote—
    it’s not too late
    although there’s a chill in the air.
    A honeyeater has just landed in the Tree of Heaven. Now another has landed. They flitted off together before I finished the sentence.
    A bright windy day. I am off to town to gather my grandson to stay here for the weekend.
    Hallelujah.
Saturday, 27th May
    I have been out sniffing the white Luculia flower. A warm white perfume, it smells like powder spilt on a dressing-table. I can still smell it, as though my nose has caught it. Perhaps that is what it is, simply pollen up the nose. Warm days, cold nights. Perfect weather. Although the pipes have burst, I am glad I am here. Last week the Water Board came after sending a great bill four times the normal. I think they must have lost some clients to suicide, because they came with such alacrity and without being asked. The man prowled around, a kind of water diviner without the stick. He found a leak behind the shed, the only place I never tread or see. Jack and I are bailing buckets from the bath, this time to do the laundry because the washing machine is in the shed and the water there is turned off. The plumber comes on Tuesday to put in copper pipes. One plumber said, ‘The place is jinxed,’ because we had so many leaks. But I don’t think so.
    The Tree of Heaven is full of tiny birds. Round and through it they are flitting like planes at a frantic airport. Jack put birdseed in the feeder hanging from the branches. The first food there for months.
    Here is my mother’s scone recipe, which is very good. In fact, she fed a family of six for almost a year with the big bag of flour (donated by the local flour mill) she won annually at the Gawler Show for these scones.
M UTTEE’S S CONES
3 heaped cups of self-raising flour
    1 / 2 teaspoon cream of tartar (many of these ancient recipes use cream of tartar, which is available on the baking shelf of supermarkets)
    2 eggs
    2 tablespoons cream or melted butter
    1 cup plus 1 tablespoon of milk
    pinch of salt
    Method:
    Sift flour and cream of tartar. Beat eggs with cream or melted butter and add milk and salt and whisk together. Fold the fluids into the sifted flour with a knife and knead gently with your fingers. It is essential that the mixture is handled as little and as lightly as possible. Roll the dough out and then fold it over once. Roll out again. (This makes the split in the side of the scone.) Cut out using a cutter or a drinking glass. Dip your fingers in milk and dab onto thescones. Bake in a very hot oven for about five minutes. In four minutes take a look and see if they have lightly browned and risen. Remove as soon as they look ready. Wrap in a tea towel immediately and allow to cool a little. Serve with jam and cream or with smoked salmon, fresh dill and sour cream.
Sunday, 28th May
    A pair of rainbow lorikeets are standing in the food bowl. How they discover food is here, I do not know. Never seen for months, they appear within hours of food being put out. Their acid-green backs are moving up and