Walking the dog up the track
through the gums and kangaroos,
down through suburbs crawling into the morning.
The dog (a dingo cross?) browses the roo poo,
which people think gross but which provides a certain consolation:
at least one of us knows how to transact with this country.
With the kangaroos themselves he blends in suspiciously well
and he’s too old to chase them. They’re symbiotic.
Back home in the wires (L asleep) I slip off into virtual space
which is of course prosaic;
the desk is an uncertain portal—
you sit for too long and it’s as if the ground wire goes
missing, the body absorbing nervous charge.
The walk is an attempt to reach back to earth,
to discharge the static.
Like a flickering hologram you
ghost through the landscape
working your head out of the cloud,
the old dog an exact guide.
