They dream ocean currents here: landlocked,
low-rise valley, foot of purgatory 
tidal and exposed to the drag of planets.

Farmers travel to Albany for holidays,
and the Southern Ocean pounds and grinds
continental granite, contorted vegetation

low to fronts always crossing, brushing...
a five-hour drive a stone’s throw away,
the white-sand beaches of Frenchman’s Bay,

white-pointers cruising deep waters
malodorous with sea shanties. Sometimes,
after retirement, it’s the Greek islands,

or the Peloponnese or Sicily... and these coastlines
also gnaw as pain and salvation, a nervous tic,
yes, yes... our paddocks were salt-water and krill.