Hybrids

Who are these ghostly figures

that levitate towards me

from the shadows

on the lunar landscape

of my dream?

They resemble people

that I loved, hated or ignored,

blended characters,

several hybrids of my mother.

New Guinean highlanders believe

the spirits of the recent dead linger

and on starless evenings of torrential rain

pipe in the quiet voice of small birds

at the doors of thatch huts of the living,

gently seeking food and maybe warmth.

I heard them in 1968

one black-ink night at Baiyer River

when enjoying hospitality of our doctor-bois.

I asked about the cheeping

I could hear above the rain:

‘Simunks!’ they told me –

and I felt unafraid.

Perhaps I should take food to bed

to feed the figures

who meet me in my dream?