Read an Excerpt

Comfort Food

University of Queensland Press

    Whole Lot

    family, earth
    dingo, eagle
    fire, food
    Whole Lot
    it's all of those things

    what we eat comes from our roots
    if we stop sharing there will be nothing

    we start with black
    let it get hold of you
    look at the stars
    or are you afraid to?

    the day shows
    country spread open
    a map of all that was and will be
    don't forget it
    I'm tracing it to remember
    don't be scared

    we are not here until we sit here
    we sit in silence and we are open
    there are different kinds of time
    I hope you'll understand
    sing it
    I want this to be here
    when I leave again
    I've been leaving a lot of times
    it doesn't mean I want to
    there is no easy way to cry
    tell them I'll be back soon
    when I come back and sit here
    I want to still see Mibunn
    powering through the sky

    let me tell you with my skin
    under the earth we will find
    Whole Lot
    it's all of those things


    Love and Tradition

    rising sea
    takes and
    breaks into backyards
    to trouble families

    we cannot live
    with the seas in our bellies
    we cannot rest
    with the sea at our legs

    the tide
    is coming
    to stroke
    our dead
    we want to know
    who unplugged
    our island
    of childhood

    island
    of love and tradition
    let them see
    what has gone under


    Pinions

    I want to know what that hawk got in the grass
    What it ate alive
    Long grass where a Fogarty, a Sandy, a Currie walked
    Shining for bones, a boomerang's hand
    'You were the last we expected to do this'
    I don't know how I feel, except for mountains
    And if they bring the artefacts back
    Will we be restored?


    Finger Limes

    Fingers find finger limes
    in my country

    We travel to the forest
    the morning after rain
    my fingers have been cold
    in the mornings

    We cross the coloured creek
    along a patient log
    we walk towards frog calls
    we walk away from winter

    I want to stop on the way back
    get some finger limes
    I've been homesick for them

    But when we return
    they are gone
    my fingers
    numb

    We go home anyway
    and you make dinner
    I'm sorry if I'm crying
    I haven't had anyone cook me a meal
    it's been a while, you know?

    We talk about what we would
    and what we wouldn't eat
    to stay who we are
    for love

    I know more
    than I can fit into thought
    memory is the last defence we have
    against cold fingers


    Generous

    Her mother has just died
    but she has bunya nuts
    a shopping bag full
    and she gives them to me

    I fill a bowl of nuts
    to take with me upstairs
    mostly to keep my hands busy
    peeling back nerves

    I've been finding it hard
    to move through
    when you're scared
    you're not very generous

    She held my shoulder
    when I spoke too fast
    wanting no-one to hear me
    in the surf

    To know and to watch her
    is to want to be brave
    she sat next to me
    split us fruit

    She will wear any T-shirt
    black and blackfulla
    put it on her
    take it to the streets

    Those West End bars
    with their pool tables
    a lemon lime and bitters
    and a good bloody cry


    Pasta

    When my parents come to stay
    I sneak out across the road
    to the bathroom at McDonald's
    so I don't wake them

    Hotel products in the shower
    complaints about the weather
    Mum hems my jeans
    while I'm at work

    That night we go to that pasta place
    'For nobody's birthday'
    we read to each other in the car
    condensation at our feet


    Pie

    caramel
    she orders
    her daughter-in-law's favourite
    she's driving the ks between states
    hoping her state of mind too will change
    but the bustle of the south-east pocket
    doesn't make her feel any more alive
    and she hopes the boy at the counter
    won't recognise her as
    regularly lonely


    Bread

    Don't tell me what my heart needs, you don't know
    that nothing turns me on more than fresh bread

    Maybe because my first lover worked in a sandwich bar
    got home with the footy crowds, didn't wash
    eyes heavy, we still made love
    still laughed and drank beer

    My lover grew anxious with crowds, hands, cheese knives
    gave up the job for the couch
    I tried to make love and laugh and drink beer
    without the thrill of midnight rye

    Two years of buying half bread or splitting it with the freezer
    sharpening knives, sleeping with the weather
    I'm not yet ready, not even for you
    to commit to the $2 whole loaf

Roo Tails

The ground felt like it did when it's about to storm. My feet were brown and my big toe blistered. My grandmother was talking to my grandfather. A wet patch on my grandmother's back. Her hands roping those tails along the fence.

She turned to me and I saw her.

A magpie flew lower.

    Prawn Tails

    to take the tail of the prawn
    squeeze the end
    see the licks of liquid
    and pull it hard
    like the ring
    stuck to your finger
    at that party
    all things come easier
    when fresh


    Tea

    what we left the tea go cold for:
    for pleasure
    the show you mine if you show me yours
    for anger
    the fifteen-year-old glare across the table
    for running to the subway
    the cup still clanging
    to the sound of her steps
    for grief
    a public sobbing
    that comes out of everywhere
    a family secret
    at the touch of lips
    let me keep your tea
    lukewarm


    Mango

    eight years old
    walking under the bridge
    scrub, swamp
    abandoned machinery
    insides of tennis balls
    bits of fences
    meeting the boys
    at the dam
    bikes in a pile
    skater shoe soles
    not cold in
    never is
    boys talking about mangoes
    slapping water
    some have never had one
    listen to the taste
    the squeeze of a cheek
    dripping chins
    a dog jumps in
    they pull on tufts of hair
    fill ears with mud
    breeze full
    clouds break
    they remember my birthday
    is tomorrow

Pumpkin

How you make those pumpkin scones so soft? Must've been cos they were Lady Flo's recipe, eh? Pump just melts in your mouth, cut open and have with cheese. Joh's land is never his land, the water sick, the fish die with their original names. Let's rip that tea towel up but keep the recipe, these pump scones the best I ever had. Turn the music down, I left Unc's pumpkin in the car. I left it and I'm away from country.

    Chips

    can I say
    white people really bore me sometimes
    to be exact
    I grow tired with what's unmentioned
    idling in surf club bathrooms
    nothing wrong with the chips
    but they're talking about Tasmania
    my thoughts haunted by islands
    I'm maybe dying
    I've too many chips
    teeth like stones
    take me to be flossed
    and cleaned
    I need new soles
    sticking to the floor
    what is happening
    with the dialogue of this country
    they are killing people with words
    if I'm not back soon
    tell them I've had too many chips


    Stamppot

    I said I wanted to grow old with you
    you said you're already old
    you will be in everything I do
    even when you go
    you've given me too many things
    I need things of my own
    I'll find ways to keep you, Mum
    we'll be on a hard drive in the future
    eating stamppot at the house in the bunya forest
    with my father


    Coffee in Toronto

    there was a sense they had slept in shredded aspen
    and were now in the city
    they didn't look down at the phone as it rang
    they didn't
    take sugar
    he could make fire out of his hands
    she sucked ice
    the forest was pushing
    the wolves and coyotes
    coming back


    Bagel

    her hands covered in cream cheese
    and the first snow drops
    waiting for the barge to move
    a friend's friend's coat
    and a friend's friend's scarf
    bite off the wind
    protect her chest
    the island is
    the lake's scar
    coming closer

Tamale

Finally, a tamale in Texas. She throats her anticipation with a hairclip and another Mexican beer. Corn husk, like Christmas, out of wrapping, out of Toni Price at the Continental. Singled out of the crowd with a slow one but who remembers, graffiti on the toilet door, every song sounds the same. Fussed by nothing but the company. The way an evening tumble-turns out of trouble, warm voices, tunnel of black beans, every tamale tastes the same.

    Berries

    she is of the bear people
    so she's first to the berries
    it is when original people are acknowledged
    the room breathes easier for me
    a preoccupation with absence
    finding the bears in buildings, universities, public gardens
    those who belong to wilderness
    take off your socks, show your fur
    and I'll show you my feathers


    Ceremonial Rice

    I meet you outside the school
    Not good, you say, and when
    I press, you say your family lost a brother today
    The wind curls on you as you speak
    a young one
    You're easy as always with the children
    smiling at the bowl of rice in your hands
    but I feel the weight when you move
    You dance the rhino
    stamping out the fire
    and when I walk home
    I hear more than the wind


    Cashew Tree

    she is one of those women I can't speak to
    shadow women
    a combination of envy and lust
    when I see her on the bus
    in a sparkly sari
    my head playing some
    old folk song
    the silver in her hair
    the song continues
    through the cashew nut plantations
    through the streets of Panaji
    the windows open
    her hair waving
    to the tune
    waving to the men
    working roads they
    won't see finished
    everything here seems unfinished
    still I watch
    with great anticipation
    for her to find my eyes

Smoking Chutney

Dance, you're making love. It's the only way you can dance. And you're on the dance floor just to get a closer look. Those hips, yes. That flank. Her hair fragrant and viral. The band also her. The beat mortar and pestle. She's pushing down, grinding those spices in the air. And you keep moving forward. Chest forward. You keep moving back. Don't fall in love if you can't live that love. Don't put that pickled hand on someone else. The closest you get is a shared flight, stopping in Bangalore. She'll smile from the tarmac. Find somewhere to preserve this. An ageless woman, an ageless goodbye.

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Excerpted from Comfort Food by Ellen van Neerven. Copyright © 2016 Ellen van Neerven. Excerpted by permission of University of Queensland Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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