Red-Eye
Coloured Pencils A4
There is a legend about cicadas. Cicadas are the souls of poets who cannot keep quiet, because when they were alive they never wrote the poems they wanted to.
Conversation with A Cicada
I sit and swelter in the shade and sink some ice-cold beers.
While the noisy sound of summer penetrates my ears.
An empty husk clings emptily upon the Ironbark.
It's occupant perched on a limb, his alarm was set for seven years.
A lonely nymph deep underground crawled out to meet his kin,
Sick of the silence, sick of the dark and totally sick of his skin.
"Oh, shrill-voiced insect, what makes you scream?" I ask.
He said, "Things called Tymbals, on my sides vibrate and make the din".
"To you it's a cacophony, to me a sweet love song".
I said "Well, what a nuisance that you must sing it all day long".
"Pretty ones are rare" he said , "the ones with diaphanous wings.
I need to call out long and loud so my song I must prolong " .
"And if she likes my serenade we find a shady twig ,
Lay on it together and do a nice cicada jig.
She pops her eggs into the bark of her favorite eucalypt.
The little nymphs fall to the ground, grab their little spades and dig.
When the lazy days are here again, with the rippling haze of summer
Black Prince comes out with all his mates, Greengrocer, Double drummer.
There are several weeks of song and sex, there's a heluva noisy party.
Then then they piss on you from lofty heights, bushwalking is a bummer.
The cicadas go from whence they came, they make their slow return to earth
Deep among the gum tree roots they calmly take their berth.
Silence then prevails. The seasons change, then with a grand announcement
They herald their arrival and sing again for all they're worth.
E Rasmanis
Wally Wombat in the Snow.... for a friend.
Pen and Watercolour on A3 Paper
En Plein Air at the Catalina War Memorial,
Rathmines
Wombat
A3 Pen - ready for a wash.
