Come Home

Eucalypts woven of silky night
Stretch tall,
Silhouetted against once buttery light
Now overshone
With the too-bright artificial skylight.

The women whisper of secrets unknown,
Calling for their children to come home-
Those who disappeared long ago.
They cry to the ink-splattered sky
And weep soft tears of moonlight,
Remembering, yearning, for that time
When the orange-bellied parrots sang their songs
Along the candy-drop skyline

The sun slinks below the tangerine sky
And the women call out yet again
Waiting patiently for their children to come home
Roots wrapping around tender soil
Shivering in their clothes of bark
And waiting
Always waiting for their children to come home.