“Move the bucket“
the voice said
And I ignored it, wrote around it instead
Sipped tea
And the dust settled softly in drifts and droves
As the cars kept driving
out on the road
sending plumes more dust through the paddock and over the fence and all over my home and all over the deck
And with nothing to fight with
I
simply
let
them
And the dust built higher
“Move the bucket” said the voice
And I ignored it
And the dust
And the mess
But mostly the bucket that just sat there sulking and grim accusingly still scowling from the last time I used it
Muddy water turned to mud, turned to dirt to dust itself in its depths
But I ignored it
And the ring on the table that my damp mug left
And the slowly dying plant
That sat to my left
Until one morning
As the Butcher bird encouraged me with song
I picked up the bucket
And hummed along
And I swept the deck
And I mopped it as well
And the bucket was clean
The mop well rung
And the thing that I had avoided
Was suddenly done
Leaving my resistance
Quite
Put
Out
*I loved the book “The War of Art” it made such sense and on so many levels, I felt that Steven Pressfield was writing directly to me. Except he wasn’t. That book struck a chord with many people and not just creatives.
We all get stuck sometimes and it can be on the damndest things, like a blooming mop bucket.
It’s so dry at the moment that my hair is electric. Our rural road has become a highway as the blocks down the road have been bought up and had houses built, tonnes of tradies and new owners back and forth, back and forth. All seemingly at 100miles an hour.
“Bastards” I mutter sometimes as another pall of dust blooms behind a car and hurtles toward our house and exposed front deck and pool.
Last time I had barely finished mopping when it seemed like ten cars went past in quick succession.
I quit in high dudgeon
And for a month hence the bucket and mop sulked. But I won’t explain because – you know, poem.
And read Stevens book “The War of Art” it’s brilliant.
The header photo is not of the road but of the dry grass blown up against a fence.
The wind, completely uncontrollable and the older I grow the more I enjoy walking in it – feeling all that gusty energy hitting me in the face and pummelling along. Not so much when I’m trying to peg washing on the line, but the rest of the time – the wind – it’s growing on me.

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