He Shrank Inside At The Thought

*



The hunchback in the park
A solitary mister
Propped between trees and water
From the opening of the garden lock
That lets the trees and water enter
Until the Sunday sombre bell at dark

Eating bread from a newspaper
Drinking water from the chained cup
That the children filled with gravel
In the fountain basin where I sailed my ship
Slept at night in a dog kennel
But nobody chained him up.

Like the park birds he came early
Like the water he sat down
And Mister they called Hey Mister
The truant boys from the town
Running when he had heard them clearly
On out of sound

Past lake and rockery
Laughing when he shook his paper
Hunchbacked in mockery
Through the loud zoo of the willow groves
Dodging the park keeper
With his stick that picked up leaves.

And the old dog sleeper
Alone between nurses and swans
While the boys among willows
Made the tigers jump out of their eyes
To roar on the rockery stones
And the groves were blue with sailors

Made all day until bell time
A woman figure without fault
Straight as a young elm
Straight and tall from his crooked bones
That she might stand in the night
After the locks and chains

All night in the unmade park
After the railings and shrubberies
The birds the grass the trees the lake
And the wild boys innocent as strawberries
Had followed the hunchback
To his kennel in the dark.

Dylan Thomas



Oh colapse, oh eat your soul, little starved, nightmare putrid, he prayed for positivity and was marked by a cringing scorn. I'm going to sleep with someone and see what you make of that, I'm going to have an affair, she said loudly and angrily to her drunken husband, who had woken up the publican for a six pack of that local favourite Bundaberg (Bundie) Rum and Coke early that morning and now, at three pm, had moved on to schooners of beer while he searched for something more lethal. See if I care, she shouted, and then stormed into the interior of the pub, the children scattering quietly because they knew their mom was angry.

He raised an eyebrow. In the mud? he asked. Don't worry about it, Phillip said, shrugging and fighting with a new cigarette packet. She gets ahead of herself. Sure enough, she was back within minutes clutching a red soft drink and sitting next to him, steaming and fuming. See you're alright! she said. Thought I'd get myself a drink. He shrugged and murmured something the bystanders couldn't hear. Up she stormed again. I'm going to have an affair and he's going to root me and then see what you think you lazy dot dot, she proceeded, and he shrank inside at the thought of his mate being publicly humiliated, and wondered too why having an affair with any of the dogs in this flea pit would be an act of revenge on anyone but yourself.

These were querelous times. Far off, there was news of Wall Street collapsing. The radio was full of apocalyptic visions from climate change hysterics. And no one trusted anyone anymore, the political debate was so corrupted. They had been very poor, their leaders. Oh bring us hither, bring us nigh. He had seen her only the night before, sitting up at the pub in plump glory talking loudly about perfume, almost everyone in that place talked loudly, and she declared with what was meant to be sophiscticated allure that as a courting girl she had loved the smell of Opium.

It was all to deny the reality, that she lived in a dirty chaotic mess of a house with five varyingly difficult children and a chronically alcoholic husband; who's good features, his cute looks, his blonde hair, his wiry figure, his lust for her, were long forgotten in the mess that was their backyard, their kitchen, their life. He watched only slightly, out of the corner of his eyes, hoping she didn't see him as an observer, someone to impress, even though he came from the city and had a proper job. She could have been a normal person, a real person with a real life and with real possibilities forthe future, the way she had sat up there in the evening cool, with the local blokes all around, talking about perfume.

Not now, as she yelled at her drunken husband and he just kept on drinking. It was impossible to imagine Phillip sober. Would he put up with her, for a start? Or would she cope with someone she could no longer manipulate, control, berate, put down. He saw all these things in flashes of time, in a place like Tambar where time forgot, where he could stand in the night and watch the stars and know there was almost no one in a 70 mile radius, a few farm houses, the remnants of people who lived in this village, old fingernails, the woman's who's purple painted claws made her an eccentric out of eccentrics.

They gathered on the veranda to watch the sunset. Even long before the dust had settled and the sky turned to pink. Across the Liverpool Plains, the gentle lines of colour, of rising land, of distant hills. Population 103 the sign said. Not likely. And most of the local lads were off the road, now there was a copper in town. They'd almost all been done for unregistered. Who could afford to register a car these days? This place was built on the depression, in a far off time when the trucks didn't roar through town and television didn't offer a world somewhere else.

He could see it in the houses, in the broken frames, in the unpainted walls. He could see it in the faces of people who had never had any ambition to do anything, or go anywhere, but here. They were happy to be here and they were happy to die here; and the rest of the world was a mirage. The gay blokes who owned the pub have taken up the lease again; after they bought a caravan and a brand new Landcruiser and set off to see Australia; only to get as far as Lake Keepit and call it quits. The scrabby Depression scarred family who took over the lease went broke, never restocking; barring all the wrong people, you can't bar people in a place like Tambar. And they were back at the Royal, on the veranda, watching the sunset, making faces as Phil swilled his beer and Marge shouted about having an affair; looking out across the settling plain. Why would anyone want to be anywhere else?



THE BIGGER STORY:

http://business.theage.com.au/business/consumer-confidence-home-loans-dive-20081008-4w78.html

Consumer confidence plunged in October as turmoil in global financial markets spurs concerns about the economic outlook on the same day home loan numbers contracted for the seven consecutive month.

The Westpac-Melbourne Institute consumer sentiment index dived 11%, or 10.2 points, to 82.0 in October one day after the Reserve Bank shocked the market by cutting interest rates by a full percentage point to 6% in order to spur the economy.

"Seven consecutive monthly declines in housing finance commitments and another sharp decline in consumer confidence towards multi-year lows adds further credibility to the RBA's dramatic move yesterday," said Matt Robinson of Moody's Economy.com.

The tumble in consumer confidence more than reversed September's 7% bounce and left the index down 28.9% on October last year. It was the biggest single contraction since August 2006.

"The deterioration in sentiment was expected," said JP Morgan economist Helen Kevans in a note to clients.

"Financial market volatility also was elevated and the global economic outlook was deteriorating rapidly."

The picture of melting consumer confidence comes as Australian housing finance commitments for owner-occupied housing fell 2.2% in August, seasonally adjusted, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said. It was the seventh consecutive month of declines.

The decline to 48,903 loans is the lowest since March 2001, seasonally adjusted.

http://www.forbes.com/afxnewslimited/feeds/afx/2008/10/07/afx5521763.html

SYDNEY, Oct 8 (Reuters) - The Australian dollar hovered close to four-year lows against the U.S. currency on Wednesday, hurt by expectations of more interest rate cuts amid mounting fears of a sharp slowdown in the global economy.


* The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) on Tuesday stunned markets by lowering the cash rate by 100 basis points, double market expectations, and left the door open for more cuts as the deepening credit crisis threatened economic activity.

* Australian bill futures are pricing in chances of more rate cuts by year end, further narrowing Australia's yield advantage over the United States.

* The spread between the two-year U.S. and Australian government bond yields eased to 280 basis points on Wednesday from 335 points at the start of the week, eroding some of the Aussie's high-yield appeal.

* By 9:45 a.m. (2245 GMT), the Aussie eased to $0.7120 from $0.7216 late here on Tuesday.

* The Aussie slumped to a four-year low of $0.6970 earlier this week, when it was hammered on fears that a global recession would hurt the nation's commodity exports and speculation the central bank would cut rates aggressively to cushion the economy.

* Worries about a global slowdown weighed down on stock markets and benefited the safe-haven yen. The Aussie fell to 72.30 yen from 74.22 yen late here on Tuesday, not far from a five-year low of 70.27 yen struck earlier this week.

* The housing finance report for August is out at 11:30 a.m. (0030 GMT), with activity expected to have remained sluggish. Analysts forecast the amount lent to decline by 1.2 percent from the previous month.

http://www.livenews.com.au/Articles/2008/10/08/Diving_star_Mitcham_sad_to_be_only_gay_in_Olympic_village

Matthew Mitcham, the 20-year-old Australian who produced a sensational final dive to stun the diving world and take gold at the Beijing Olympics, said it is “sad” he was the only openly gay man at the Games.

Mitcham’s gold has propelled him into the spotlight, and he now hopes to pave the way for others after being the only man out of 10,500 Olympic athletes to publically say he was gay.

“I was actually very surprised I was the only ‘out’ male at the Olympic Games,” Mitcham told reporters yesterday.

“It’s a little bit sad I think, because statistically there should be a lot more but, you know what, it’s each to one’s own.

“I’m not going to pressure anybody else to come out of the closet because it’s their own choice.

“But I’m proud to be there, proud to be that one, that lots of other people can look up to.”

Before the games Mitcham struggled for money as he juggled diving training with an office job.

Now, with Ian Thorpe’s manager Dave Flaskas representing him, the new-found attention is set to bring in the sponsor dollars and make life easier in the lead up to London 2012.

“Money was a huge stress leading into the Olympics for two years and for that to not be a massive burden on me leading into the next Olympics would be nice,” Mitcham said.

“But that’s an ideal world and who knows what’s going to happen.”