Jonathan Kimberley

Ur-landscape : Post-landscape (Blue Tier)
FORTYFIVEDOWNSTAIRS, Melbourne
26 April to 07 May 2005

blue tears in manalargenna country

warbling water moving fast in a creek-bed journey

past the weathered myrtles that look over tea tree stands

spiked with pepper-trees on green carpets of moss

over the quartz stoned bed on white sands in water

with creek walls of green under small fern sentinels

and where sassafras trees poke out amongst white trunks

the water calls in colour a history of blue tears

with myrtle leaves of all colours settled on the green carpet

and others in the water’s journey along small rapids

until caught on the walls of green moss where they gather

in the stillness of silent life over the warbling water

with its song of a history when people in its memory

celebrated the water song in the high blue country

and on down to low country at the feet of mountains

where the stillness follows tea tree trails along a snaking creek

through the criss-crosses of whitish trunks at water’s edge

letting water speak in low tones as it passes over silent sands

until again its journey speeds and water sings its colours

as reminders to the wind’s lament of watery blue tears

yet birds are still and the rocky quartz sings alone

as a vocal in water’s song of warbling in a silent bed

while pepper-trees show a reddish green under myrtle’s shimmer

of greenish white and black colours in the wind’s icy sting

letting the light string its way over rainbow rocks

and green with white on the mossy furs of carpet floors

in tea tree stands and rotting spars of trees now gone

while onwards the warbling water in its snake creek journey

with spiritual memories of a history and love for country

reminding those who can hear its song in new worlds

to bring back shared journeys on a land of blue tears.

Jim Everett

Return  to Jonathan's exhibition Ur-landscape : Post-landscape (Blue Tier)