The Father's Line

Sunrise in the outback is a surprisingly noisy event. Even as the first dusty colours creep out to play across the horizon, the kookaburras start. Rich percussive calls, bouncing off the crisp air giving permission to the smaller birds to start their own tweeting and squeaking through the bush. Only a few birds at first but before long, as the rest of the colours begin to join their siblings in the sky, the whole landscape comes alive with sound. And in the midst of it all, a majestic song begins, following a melody as complex as the very land it reverberates through. From his perch at the top of an old dead Eucalypt the Magpie calls in the morning, and everyone, it seems, even the Earth herself, stops to listen.

But that was before. Before the long line of dust came following that white ute cutting its fierce line through the country, through the magpies’ land, leaving its long, thin dust cloud to flee, dissipating through the trees.

Myrul’s dad now lay at the side of that road a little way down from her new home. It was a hard thing for her to understand, but as the days had gathered since then, she’d slowly come to know the effects. There were no more powerful morning calls or gentle warbling. No more admiring him looking out from the top of the big eucalypt. She missed how he used to bravely chase the hawks and crows away. There were to be no more of his lessons either, harsh sometimes but always valuable. How would she learn now? He would tell her how the teaching was passed down from generation to generation and now it was her turn. It would have been her turn. Her chest and stomach ached and a soft coo escaped her throat as she remembered snuggling into his sleek black and white feathers at night.

Today as she woke she again heard the gap in the world as it mourned the loss of her father’s morning call. She tried her own call in an attempt to fill the space, but her throat tightened and instead of a clear, flutey sound, all that came was a kind of broken “coo”. She breathed in and tried again. This time, pulling her emotions from the depths of her body, she raised her head, stretched out her body, and cried out, her full throated elegy filling the land. Moved and comforted by the vibrations of her sound flowing through her, she sang again, and again. After a while her tension finally ebbed out with the last echoes of her song and as it did she noticed the quietness around her. The small birds had even stopped and were flitting into the low trees. She watched as a lizard darted off the road, magically disappearing into the shadows. And then she saw why.

The line approached, dust rising from the road dividing the land as it came. She looked harder and noticed a white ute, just like the one that hit her father, coming along the road pulling the long red cloud behind it. Then the sound began to arrive, a low rumble at first then harsh rattling sounds as it pummelled over potholes and corrugations. Myrul felt the fear rising in her stomach too late. She was high in a tree right next to the road, but as she raised her wings to fly away, she found her feet had gripped onto the thin branch and were not letting go. The ute was getting close now, the noise getting almost too much to bear and still, Myrul could not move. She ducked her head low just in time for the ute to reach her and in a cacophony of roaring, rattles, and bumps, the big machine passed.

From her tight, crouched position, wings pulled back, head tucked down, she watched out the corner of her eye in horror as a flurry of black and white left the back of the ute, rising up from a black bag, flung loose as the vehicle bounced on one of the deep holes that punctuated the road. It floated through the air for a moment then landed lifeless in the dry dirt on the side of the road. The ute finally disappeared through the trees leaving its dust to dissolve into the bush and Myrul clinging to her branch, watching, fear perhaps just starting to subside. All the while, she didn’t take her eyes off that thing. It occasionally moved and fluttered in the breeze, but as Myrul watched, she noticed to her relief that they weren’t feathers that were moving. Not this time.

As Myral’s curiosity held her gaze it fluttered again, then to her utter surprise, it sparkled, a bright bronze flash reflecting the morning sun into her eyes. She blinked and, curiosity gently prying away the last of her fear, she let go of her branch and curved down, gently lighting on the ground near the thing. From this perspective, she could now see that it was a small rectangle object. On top was a piece of pure black, thin as a leaf. As the air moved it lifted the black thing and under it she saw the breeze playing through many white leaves, also rectangular. There was another black leaf under all of them, and all these leaves seemed to be joined together on one side. All up it was no bigger than she was tall. And it was as thin as her leg. She’d never seen anything like this in the bush.

Gathering confidence she hopped over to it and after a brief pause began to peck at the black cover. She grabbed it tentatively in her beak and pulled at it causing it to flip over and reveal what was the first page of a small notebook. Myrul jumped back in shock because there, staring back at her, marked out on that first page was a bird. Not just any bird. The black charcoal scratchings on the white paper revealed the distinct markings of another Magpie. Myrul recognised at once that it wasn’t real, but it was unmistakable. This charcoal depiction was gripping a high branch and was mid call, beak open, held high and proud. Feeling tightness in her chest beginning again she quickly grabbed the page and flicked it over. Another bird looked out at her. A different one this time. Grab, pull, grab pull. Myrul flicked page after page perplexed at all the creatures within. What was this thing? Grab, pull, flash. Myrul stopped and stared. This page was different. This must have been what caught her eye from the tree. Right there in the middle of the page was a round, shiny thing with markings on it, like you sometimes found on the skin of big trees. It was held to the page with strange transparent strips. They reminded Myrul of a spider web, but instead of thin and stringy these were flat and clear. There were also a lot of markings on the page itself around the coin but no picture this time. As Myrul pecked at the clear sticky stuff, trying to release the coin from it’s grip, she felt that she had found something incredibly special. Something that was more than just a shiny thing, but that had substance, lore, history. She didn’t really know what it was but at this point, she was ok with that. She shook the last of the sticky tape off her beak and, grabbing the coin darted up into a nearby branch leaving the book lying open on the ground, its cryptic message open to the sky.

The sky couldn’t read those markings on the page, but if it could it would have read this:

“Dear Amy.

Down the line from my father to me, and now from me to you.

1915 Halfpenny - H

Recently valued at approx. $20,000

Hold on to it.

I will miss you Chicky.

Love, Grandad.”

Myrul launched off the branch and started to fly, her new treasure glinting in her beak. She knew exactly where she had to go. Flapping up and up she finally landed on a thick branch next to a huge mass of tiny twigs and grass. It was her birthplace, her nest. The closest thing she had to home. It had been quite a while since she’d been here. There wasn’t much need for a nest now that she could fly properly, but here it was, pretty much just the same as last time she was here. Hopping into the small circle, she felt her chest tighten again, the sensations in her body reminding her of the love and care she received here. Carefully maneuvering the coin, she tucked it securely into the bottom of the nest, paused for a moment then stood up onto the edge, looking out over the bush.

Myrul watched for a moment as a couple of small birds flitted about and shot into a low tree. In the distance, she could hear the Kookaburras starting up again. Off in the other direction, she could hear some currawongs getting excited about something. She watched as a soft breeze caressed the treetops, then felt its gentle touch on her feathers as it moved by. Under her feet, she felt the slow, eternal sway of the big Eucalypt. Breathing in deeply she raised her head and, summoning all she had, she called out. Her powerful voice penetrated through that landscape, a sound that bypassed minds and spoke straight to the heart, the message clear as day - “I will miss you Dad.”