I see the sunburnt children climb and play And grip the
iron-clad souls of Lizzie’s ghosts. Spawned in back-yard dreams
of a fertile mind. She laid her self-made track in drifting sand
And gouged a dream of nope in her bludgeoning wake Part tank, part
home, she lumbered slowly north, Predestined not to reach her
journey’s end But washed up on the doorstep of a flood.
Among the fallen trees and choir of axes Her strident voice was
thunder to the ears. A settler paused to mop his sweating brow, His
paradise a burning scrub-wood pyre, As Lizzie toiled and tore a
stubborn stump From fleshy darkness of unwilling soil. The settler
marvelled at Big Lizzie’s might And speed with which she
cleared the mallee scrub.
Today she lies snug and covered from the sun, Among the trees in
Red cliffs’ Barclay Square. Her work with settlers finished
long ago, This stagnant monster sells her verbal tale To shuffling
tourists who capture her on film, And welcomes children with a
secret sign.
