Cirrus@Austlit

A poem in five, untitled parts. The speaker appears to be standing by the Derwent River in Tasmania, seeing it simultaneously as the River Styx of Greek mythology, which was thought to form the boundary between Earth and the Underworld. Lines in one stanza declare: 'lecz beskid dotknięty pożarem gdzie diabeł tasmański/tropi leniwe ścieżki do nieba/jest tylko przedpolem rzeki styx/dopływu rzeki derwent' ('but the beskid [the name of a mountain range in Poland] touched by fire where the tasmanian devil/makes its lazy tracks to the sky/is only the foreground of the river styx/an inlet of the derwent river'). The reference to the Polish mountain range 'Beskid' appears to imply that the speaker identifies a mountain in Tasmania with a Polish mountain; the mixing of landscapes, Australian, Polish and those drawn from Greek mythology, obliquely suggests migrant experiences and perceptions.