Melanie Fiedler

Eucalypt Touch

Red dust, thorough steps
she is the wild

in love with the earth
feeling the part that she is of it all

climbing the rocks

soft like a feather
calls of a dingo pierce through her heart
her body, the bark
touching her hair

silky rays in crisp air

a poem in whispers, the voices of spirits
old and new sounds, beneath desert grounds
shaping her movements
up down and around

a eucalypt touch is never too much

she dances for the silent silver trees

the river feels her shivers
the Eastside jacarandas wither
and she wanders
through green Alice lanes, a maze of things

into the salt bush haze

hidden from view, she still knew
the land could see the sad gaze
in her face

lips moving words, gentle
until suddenly,

she hears wild dogs fight
thorns under skies
in a changing, pink orange night

all these living bodies

animal plant homo natura[1]
Friedrich said it so well: "vivo ergo cogito"[2]

lets be sapiens and crack this convenient shell

it is glowing on the outside

and inside- this heat

flames, passion and fire
a wish and desire
to say yes to it all

everything, breathing in rhythm
creating

rarely holding but unfolding
like flowers
she picks a wild desert rose

striking a pose

the birds arrive, she sits for a while
underneath eagle eyes and crows cries
thinking
sinking into cork wood dreams
it’s ashes

and the scent of a nectar so sweet it seems.

A poem by Melanie Fiedler

written for Melankolia Exhibition at Watch This Space, 2016

performed by Betty Sweetlove on Opening Night

[1] Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, §230.

[2] Nietzsche, On the Uses and Disadvantages of History for Life, §10.