Pondering with Pelicans

Mannum, South Australia

So balanced in flight but awkward on land
on a flimsy perch they choose to stand.
Full-grown ones command the space,
four young ones squat between –
is it narcissism or a chance to preen
or looking for prey
in the river’s clear screen?

One seems startled by the image he sees,
another questioning – is it a rival for feed
in the shifting crinkled forms beneath
screened by the tangled reeds?

Waiting for it

Adelaide, South Australia

Sitting safely under cover I’m
watching it, the heavy rain, as it
crashes down, hurtles along the roof
in heavy channels, then picking up speed
like race horses on the last straight
spills out of the drains drenching the ground
that slurps it up then spits it round.

But most of all, out on the wires
where galahs are perched
hanging upside down, then up and over
twirling around in circles, presumably
to flush out the under wing
having the time of their lives – this
is what they’ve been waiting for.

Ros Schulz spent her childhood in the Barossa Valley and Murray Mallee before settling in Adelaide. A mother of four and grandmother of six, she has strong interests in children and people in general, in mental health, and in the landscape and nature. A high school teacher for 12 years in country South Australia and Adelaide and for a year in London, she was also a TAFE lecturer in Communication Studies for a further 15 years, writing resource books. A dual past winner of Mindshare’s Open Your Mind Poetry Competition, an initiative of the Mental Health Coalition of South Australia, she has appeared in all the Friendly Street Anthologies since Reader 21, and in Australian journals and magazines. She has published three collections of her poetry, including two chapbooks. Ros is co-editor of Friendly Street’s 2017 Anthology, Reader 42, to be published soon.

Readers’ original and unpublished poems of up to 40 lines can be emailed, with postal address, to [email protected]. Submissions should be in the body of the email, not as attachments. A poetry book will be awarded to each accepted contributor.