The March.(Poem)

 
THE MARCH 
 
   Pitt St. Just after the Dawn Service, April '08, my first. 
   I'm here because somehow I want to have my father back, 
   To take him from the photos taken just three years ago, 
   --When he was pink-cheeked, sure-footed, erect, 
   And have him back. "Hey Bob, Hey Pa, Dad, over here!" 
 
   I feel a fraud, small and unwashed, wearing his service medals, 
   Going to line up with those blokes we'd abused back during Vietnam. 
   The street's deserted, the crowd's ducked off, most into the early 
     opening 
   McDonalds, it seems. Workers in their fluoro jackets 
   From a Sydney City Council truck hose down the gutters. 
   Light, grey and foreign, after the warmer dark, slides across ...