MARY BLACKWOOD

You cannot know

You cannot know which day will be your last
when everything you know will fall away.
The future stopped. The present now the past.

You only know time’s travelling so fast -
your futile hands would stop the end of day.
You cannot know which day will be your last.

The horses harnessed, chatting slaves, the blast
preserved in ash, an instant in Pompeii.
The future stopped. The present now the past.

It’s been the brightest day, the sea like glass.
A wall of water thunders through the bay.
You cannot know which day will be your last.

They called you from the ambulance, aghast.
A game of golf. A normal Saturday...
The future stopped. The present now the past.

The play is written, missing just the cast,
the billboards saying where, and on what day.
You cannot know which day will be your last.
The future stopped. The present now the past.

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Mary Blackwood’s earliest published poem was in the first edition of the Tasmanian Review in 1979, and her most recent poems have been in Blue Giraffe and Prospect in 2014 and 2015. In between she has had published about twenty poems in literary journals and anthologies. In September Ginninderra will publish her collected poems under the title Small Cosmos.

Her rhyming children’s picture book Derek the Dinosaur, illustrated by Kerry Argent, was first published by Omnibus Books in 1987 and was continuously in print until 2012.

Born and educated in Hobart, Mary worked with the Department of Health, first as a clinical psychologist and later in a number of senior management roles, most notably in mental health. She retired in 2013.

Mary lives in Hobart.