Dear Bianca

You see dead people, I see a good dear friend
It's like I've known you forever, I love you and I never
Want to lose you, or your dear friendship
I can't believe it's only been eight short months since
We met and poured out our hearts to each other
It's like I've met you so many years ago
You've been my sister and my mother
I really want no other, I need you on my side; I feel your pain
Like conjoined twins share their highs and lows together
I can't believe it was your artwork on those stobie poles
I can't believe you lived at 45 Margaret street in dear old North Adelaide
When you wandered down those streets
You painted your life and your father's in your soulful art
He was that strong black bird, I saw your bright Galah
Pretty flowers and so much more!
What art you had in store for those who drove those lanes
Thank you for the pains you took, to decorate those dreary suburban streets
Without your art they seemed like unto the dead
And lonely streets of old black and white TV


When I mentioned Bonegila, that refugee camp of old
Your parents there as well, their two years there of hell
Waiting to be allowed to claim a bit of life on these Australian shores
My parents there eight years later, in their own peculiar hell
I was born at Albury Base Hospital, no English my mum knew
No Birth certificate for me there, just a little note that said
"A living female infant born".


You remember Albury. I don't: only as my place of birth
Then I see pictures in cold Tassie,  my parents there with me
A tiny babe in arms with our sponsor family Janis Pankelis
Then later, Keith and Ada Boys, I still remember the joys
As five years later on we visited and that holiday
I remember clear as day, the trip across the seas
On the Princess of Tasmania: I still recall their home
My little cubby house underneath their homely space
I remember that tractor ride, those trees so tall with pride
I remember those sky rockets, the fire crackers in the night sky
Then back to Melbourne we went, then Geelong with close friends the Easter spent
I recall the visitors; not wanting to give my eggs for their sprinkle of perfume
No fair trade in my mind, my stance it spoke volumes!
But the joy I felt inside when the rockets sped skyward
That joy so oft repeated in my mind
Especially as November did draw near here in South Aussie
You could hear the sky rockets without fear on Guy Fawkes Night
And penny-bungers far and near, what a special time when I was five!
The night skies came alive, celebrations everywhere, now as I think back!


You saw three around me then and there
My Grandma, I recall, her loving arms did embrace
Her dimpled smile upon her face, for three short months I did her know
As their holiday from Hungary, such a short time it did take
Before they left to re-embark on their journey home again
Only then did she remark "If only we could have stayed a year!
Three months too short a space to visit this sun filled place!"
My dear Grandpa, carpenter by his trade, a special verandah he made
All dovetailed and made with love! still it keeps the home protected
From the harsh South Aussie sun! I feel sadness deep inside
That home no longer ours, since dad's illness took it away
No longer could we stay beneath that verandah made with his loving tender care
Now another family does share his lifeblood given there in Kingston-on-Murray.


Now those other two you saw, the giggling one I can't recall
But I'll look around in family history and surely find her somewhere.
The gentleman with the slicked back greying hair, who is he and should I care?
I don't know, I'll ask my mother!


Now it is 2012 and time has flown along
My dearest cousin you recognised from my family album
His dimples were so strong and easy to recognise
I think of him a lot and miss his ready smiles.


Still don't know the giggling one!
But the other snob, tiara and all, is sure to be that ancestor
Who gambled all the wealth away, that duchess or whatever she was
Don't even know her name!


(Mum knew her name: Baroness Sarolta Varadi)