Welcome

Hi, my name is Alys Jackson and I'm an author and poet

based in Adelaide, South Australia.

My work has been published in books, magazines,

anthologies and online.

The Tracker

The Tracker

The tracker came during the coldest autumn on record,

minus eight and a freezing blizzard drifting him in.

We sat him by the stove, fed him on salt-dried tench

and barley; hot, thick and sweetened with honey

and a quiet word of thanks.

 

The world outside stubbled the window with ice

and hard-rime pellets clustered in the trees

to snatch the rising sun into a thousand frozen opals

that dripped their load into a skin-chafed sky.

 

He talked stories that trimmed the rafters with colour,

wolves tore shivers from our flesh, their howls

a black-ice winter’s night with the tawny eyes of a devil.

It was a miracle, he said. He showed us the scars.

 

The hunter of skins had been flayed in return,

left leg stripped to the bone, blood turning snow

into a gore-spotted frappé that frosted his clothes

and turned ice melt into a spicy pinot noir.

 

He didn’t stay long but his stories lingered

like graffiti on the side of a wall; dissident images

refusing to relinquish their ownership, their unrequited horror.

It was many years before I took to red wine,

and I never could face a frappé.

Leave a comment