Lately I’ve been walking—
late Kambarang, early Birak—
through the unburnt kindling
of the shedded skin
of introduced eucalypts.

They’ve been planted on the 
old golfcourse
now parkland
by the edge of Galbamaanup 
Lake Claremont.

Ghost gums, I think.
Their bark crackles,
crispy,
like rock-hard cardboard,
as I walk over it,
even on a bed of spongy grass
beneath.

It sounds to me of fires
unmet, unspent,
appointments unkept.

I cannot burn it—
I’d be locked up;
anyone would.

Here, conditions are
no longer right.
Here, there is no longer
fire.

But I, I continue
to also walk this shoreline—
between old and new,
between burned and unburned,
between fire and no fire,
with other humans
too,
aflame.