John Butler
Far North Queensland; August, 2016

It’s the middle of winter. Never mind, we’re wearing shorts and thongs. The sky is an unbroken plain of blue. Well, not entirely unbroken. Here and there, a pillar of white smoke plumes from a cane mill. A small assertion of the priorities of commerce on the bigger picture.

Rusty cane trains trundle a lugubrious path. The traffic waits, largely unperturbed.

I recall a schoolboy coming home
through fields of cane
to a house of tin and timber
and in the sky
a rain of falling cinders

Grant McLennan was born in Rocky, but grew up in Cairns. His father died when he was young. His mum remarried, and the family relocated to a cattle station. Grant went to boarding school in Brisbane.  Up here, when they refer to ‘the South’, they mean Brisbane.

We sit under a palm tree and look across the water to an island. The water looks idyllic, but the locals warn us of stingers and crocs. The island is Palm Island. Memories of Cameron Doomadgee and Christopher Hurley. One man dead. The other cleared, but permanently marked. On the island, we hear of trouble and strife. Just a short boat ride away, on the mainland, most locals don’t even lock their doors. Two worlds. Two very different experiences.

from time to time
the waste memory-wastes

In a laneway off the main street in Ingham, a tremendous work of communal art. Sixty metres of tiled mosaic, designed and assembled by the community. Pride in community. Pride in the sugar industry, which sustained that community. But a pride not blind to history. The mural acknowledges the people we called Kanakas: Polynesians drawn to Australia by promises largely broken. A people we dispensed with when they no longer served European purpose. When we officially declared this Australia a White Australia. Much to be proud of, but also debts unpaid. This is our history.

from time to time
the waste memory-wastes
the waste memory-wastes

Further north, Cardwell sits by the water. In 2011, Cyclone Yasi flattened  the area. Flattened buildings. Flattened aspirations. But the locals have rebuilt. When you ask them, most say it’s just the price you pay. Most say it’s worth it.

On the road back south, a new lookout has been built. Glorious views across to the southern end of Hinchinbrook Island. Then someone decided to run an enormous power line right through the vista. Something does not belong in this picture. A not so small assertion of the priorities of commerce on the bigger picture.

I recall a boy in bigger pants
like everyone
just waiting for a chance
his father’s watch
he left it in the showers

Grant McLennan wrote this song to his mother, while he was feeling homesick in England, pursuing bigger dreams. Many of those dreams were realised. The Go-Betweens were never huge, but their work endures. They broke up, got back together. This is the way of so many bands. Grant returned, eventually, to Brisbane. Like his father, he died too soon.

further, longer, higher, older 

We fly back south. When we say ‘the South’ we mean Victoria, a place with four identifiable seasons. Melbourne doesn’t need cane trains to bring traffic to a standstill. It is a sprawling city. There are now many different Melbourne experiences being lived. Between all these competing realities, it is easy to miss the fact that the view from down here can be very different from the view up there. It is a very Australian thing to miss this fact. We need to consider what that costs us.

 

John Butler has spent many nights treading the sticky carpet. You will usually find him down the back, or to the side.