The Ring & the BottleA Poem by David Lewis PagetThey’d
sat beneath the sweltering sun For
an hour, or maybe two, Lost
somewhere on the Birdsville Track They
didn’t know what to do. ‘Stay
with the car,’ said Derek Beech, ‘They’ll
come and find us soon.’ ‘Better
we walk,’ said Colleen Scott, ‘Til
we find that last lagoon.’ They
glared and bickered, and pursed their lips, The
battlelines were drawn, He
to stay with the crippled car, She
to go wandering on. ‘The
temperature’s hitting fifty C If
you go, you won’t survive.’ ‘Rather
than dehydrate out here, I
want to get out alive!’ They’d
driven through Cooper’s Crossing As
the day was becoming dark, He
had been keen for pushing on Though
she had wanted to park. The
driver had the advantage, so Their
lights cut into the night, In
through the gibber country, where The
tracks crossed, left and right. They’d
entered the Stony Desert when The
first of the tyres blew, They’d
only taken a single spare, She
said, ‘That’s down to you!’ It
took an hour to change it Trying
to jack the car in the sand, The
jack would sink in the bulldust mix So
she had to lend a hand. By
morning they were completely lost And
the radiator boiled, The
lights had flashed all over the dash And
the motor suddenly stalled. ‘I
can’t believe that we’re stuck out here,’ She’d
wailed, and punched his arm, ‘Why
did I ever listen to you? I
should have stayed on the farm.’ ‘Maybe
you should,’ said Derek Beech, His
temper beginning to show, ‘You’re
not much good at the outback life, Go
back to your Auntie Flo!’ ‘That’s
it,’ she said, and she pulled the ring He’d
given her days before, Flung
it down in his lap, and watched It
bounce to the desert floor. She
took a bottle of water, then Stomped
off the way that they came, ‘If
you get lost you will die out there With
only yourself to blame!’ She
took a short cut back to the track They’d
turned off, hours before, And
gradually drank the water, though She
knew that she needed more. The
endless dry and barren land Had
not seen rain for years, The
track wiped out by the drifting sand, Colleen
was soon in tears, She
stopped beneath a coolibah tree Surviving
on its own, And
rested there in the paltry shade In
the land of the great unknown. While
Derek sat in an agony Of
doubts, to cloud his mind, Should
he have gone along with her, Or
should he have stayed behind? Some
hours had passed before he rose To
place the ring on the car, Along
with a note, ‘I love you, girl, But
I don’t know where you are.’ He
started to walk the way she’d gone, The
sun, it was going down, He
knew that hope was a step too far As
he walked along, and frowned, If
only he’d thought to call her name Snapped
out of his mute dismay, He
might have met her along the track, Coming
the other way. They
were only a hundred yards apart When
they passed like ships in the night, And
she had stumbled back to the car When
the sun put gloom to flight, She
found the note and she found the ring And
she placed it back on her hand, Then
sank beside their wreck of a car And
was covered by drifting sand. While
he was found, propped up by the tree In
the glare of the blazing sun, His
final thought of the way they’d fought That
never could be undone. But
love was there in the desert air As
she lay, the ring on her hand, While
he clung on to the bottle, she’d Flung
empty, down on the sand. David
Lewis Paget © 2013 David Lewis PagetFeatured Review
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10 Reviews  Last Updated on July 15, 2013 Tags: Birdsville, Stony Desert, motor, barren Author
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