Classic Poem

is what they are in Austinmer.
Yuppies from the North Shore, $300,000
homes on the beach front, sending
the RSL broke & the greenies
blocking development for a few birds
up an estuary. Could be worse,
given the Japs on the Gold Coast
going off like mobile phones.
The miners & cottages are long gone &
so is full employment. In 1941
as a telegraph delivery boy I made
13 shillings 10 a week. Across
the Harbour Bridge to the North Shore
on a regulation red bike. Sunday
was the day for casualty messages,
the dead & wounded delivered
all over Sydney except Vine street,
Darlington, where Darcy the Crim lived
& the most dangerous place in town.
I came to Austinmer 30 years ago
before the Wardrobe Drinkers
in the days of the miners & cottages.
Take those grain & coal carriers
upwards of 250,000 tonnes with a 12
man crew, anchored stern to wind,
off Hill 60 out of Port Kembla
navigated by satellite direct to Japan.
You want the best view? Sublime Pt.
Lookout, right down the coast, the
Pacific ironed flat far as the eye can
see, a sky expanded metal-red nightly.