tramping up through the jarrah-marri woodland:

‘g’day, mate,’ a plaid-shirted youth says, and he
leans on a shovel, he stamps mud from his boots:

we stop, ask why he is doing what he is doing:
‘work experience, mate: we’s repairin’ the track:

it don’t look after itself, ya know: all them feet
stompin’, and all that rain, and only one track:’

he swigs from a water bottle as the others of his
team shift dirt, pack stones, dig runnels, lay logs:
 
‘thirsty work, mate,’ he grins, ‘but no worries, we
got our bevvies waitin’ for us back at the camp:’

and we nod and tramp on up, steps, rocks, mud,
roots, up the slopes as the woodland gives way

to mallee-heath and scrub of banksia, of yellow
dryandra and of xanthorrhoea and scarlet-lipped

beaufortia bottlebrush, and then the saddle and
its blast of wind and turning up along the ridge

through kwongan thickets of boronia, sweet with
aniseed, and of pink-headed pixie mops among

the mountain bells that blow red, and they blow
yellow, and the summit is there, it is almost there,

and the track eases as it rises as the air shivers
clean and quick, cool to the throat, and then the

topping out, the crown, the platform of layered
rock and wind-cropped scrub, and we set down

our packs and the weight lifts and we catch our
breath and somebody hands around a packet of

Tim Tam double-chocolate and we swallow warm
Pepsi from a plastic bottle and murmur as the sugar

kicks in and the dopamine races: we stand above,
we stand over all: from here, everything is clear:

from here, the peaks, pinnacles, and mounts and
eminences, turrets, spires, knobs and hills that rise

up, high places that rise up: Coyanarup and steep
Toolbrunup and Isongerup, Pyungoorup, and Gog

and Magog and Mondurup, Talyuberlup, that rise,
and Toolyelup, Kyanorup, Moongoongoonderup:

from here, the semantic lines and planes of land
stripped, parcelled, of ownership and production,

of fences and roads and paddocks, pastures, wheat
fields: and from here, beyond, at the lip of eye, the

projections, figurations, lineaments, surrendering
shape, forfeiting reference, permanence, and the

lines and planes losing power, losing meaning, as
they rot, wither to mere marks that empty into the

stitching of sky and land, the continuum of round,
all one at last, absolute rest: and here we stand, and

we look, catch sight, and we stand about and look
and glimpse, and soon we thirst and we want water

and we drink from our bottles, drink them dry, and
yet we thirst, still thirst, it seems there is no end to

our thirst after the tramp, the steep of the track, the
rock, and mud, the roots, the stepping, the sighting:

from here, all is clear, and there is nowhere to go,
but down, back, scrambling, hurrying, and to rush

for water: ‘mind the track!’ the plaid-shirted youth
shouts, ‘only one track, ya know, and it don’t like

 yer stompin’ and shovin’, it don’t take it, ya know’