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January on the Gold Coast
- Hong Kong University Press, HKU
- Chapter
- Additional Information
96 Conversation The various declensions Of layered self-deprecation The sleight of hand The tour de force The quick of an eye The quarter smile Positions endlessly qualified Points developed and redefined Space made From artful modesty The polite insult Collectively constitute the “whinge” here January on the Gold Coast Have I come To this strange land Only to be held hostage By the heat Every house Has a fireplace From open ones To the most elaborate of boilers And there is no winter here Air-conditioning Is still foreign 97 And the heat rages from day to day Confined and confounded The blank face Meets the blank day Surely Sufferance of suffocating heat Need no longer be Part of the human condition Think you They are hostage To their past Forgetting They are now in Queensland Australia Far from some fiercely cold and bleak English or Irish province Where heating Was a hard premium Sizzle your meats and sausages On a mightily sizzling day Heat up your houses Through the warm winter Kill the cold In your ancestors’ bones You live the remains Of their ancient ravages Is this the Australian way ...