Voice

Greg McLaren

Bleating comes out of her, clucking,

some wild species of bray that turns

to clear and chiming song—her first

night at home, in the bassinet beside

our bed, a kind of hex passing across

the rented air, this wild and unexpected

thing far beyond love. Galah, magpie,

frog. Her untutored mouth rings

like a lyrebird’s range of song, brief,

tiny shards of it rise from her sleep,

lightest mist above still dewy grass,

then a distant duck in a field, but

edged for me with fear, grief, terror

at the size of this love, the steepening

climb into another life, the risk of joy.

GREG McLAREN is a poet and teacher who lives on unceded Dharug Country. His work has been almost widely anthologised. He is the author of the verse novel camping underground. Other books include Windfall, Australian ravens and The Kurri Kurri Book of the Dead. A new book, Whipbirds, is forthcoming.