Comete

Portrait of Les Murray
Les Murray 1938–2019

Uphill in Melbourne on a beautiful day a woman is walking ahead of her hair. Like teak oiled soft to fracture and sway it hung to her heels and seconded her as a pencilled retinue, an unscrolling title to ploughland, edged with ripe rows of dress, a sheathed wing that couldn't fly her at all, only itself, loosely, and her spirits. A largesse of life and self, brushed all calm and out, its abstracted attempts on her mouth weren't seen, not its showering, its tenting. Just the detail that swam in its flow-lines, glossing about-- as she paced on, comet-like, face to the sun.

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