June 23, 2019

My Ancestor the Captain's Ghost in Adelaide

(Note the trip was partly to check out the home of Australian submarine building at Osborne (up from Semaphore) Adelaide. And a non-poetic security aspect)

Two sunny days drive
Good sense denied
Stay awake
Stay alive

Long, scrubby road
Medication adjusted
Sleep interrupted
Navigation corrupted

Inland drought a Lawson-esque story
A sad sight Narrander[y
Town centre’s dead
Grey shops long closed
Nary McDonalds nor KFC colour exposed

South Australia confronts
Drought in Barossa, 11mm rain in 4 months
A weekend escape
Wine tastings le grape

Ten days on Adelaide’s Semaphore shore
Leads to my ancestors' door
Sun dancing on sea
Nostalgia for free

carries the accolade
To those gallant sea-captains
who visited Adelaide

List of sea-captains on plague starts: “Capt. William Begg
Begg is/was my great-great Grandfather,
Dour Scot of warm heart
His 2 legs in a storm broke apart
But he walked on canes still
On slippery docks and uphill

From Glasgow to Adelaide, he sailed 1855
Then settled in Adelaide 1870s alive
Harbour Master of Port Adelaide, before dying 1889
With his Ghost I communed with a glass o’wine.

Of my ancestors 7/8ths Protty Iro-Scots watch out!
Were born in Adelaide, rarely devout.
And 1/8th? A Jewish Grandmother, an outsider
Her existence suppressed. Memories denied her.

Adelaide's shipbuilding din.
Would take me too far from my kin.
So I blissfully return to my humble home
Where whales fly and wombats roam
A place of optimism, warmth and friendship for free

Where I commune with ghost Captain’s love of the sea.


Pete

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