Where the Line Breaks by Michael Burrows

Author:Michael Burrows
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Fremantle Press
Published: 2021-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

58 Trooper G. Roberton in conversation with Curtin-Kneeling, in From Busso to the Holy Land, p. 44.

59 I can also personally recommend J. Buckley’s Heroes of the Cross: Australian Recipients of the Victoria Cross (Penguin, Sydney, 1984), which was one of the first books to delve into Lewis’s past in an attempt to understand him, and L.L. Hereford’s original postwar study of the Victoria Cross recipients in They Walk Amongst Us, which, though published in the early thirties and somewhat dated, provides the best overview of Lewis’s storied career.

60 The Regimental Scrapbook of the 10th Light Horse Regiment.

61 The Regimental Scrapbook of the 10th Light Horse Regiment.

62 Pyke, The Annotated Letters, p. 81. Rarely does Lewis reveal his feelings of abject depression and lack of confidence as candidly as he does in this startling letter, which Curtin-Kneeling refers to several times as evidence of the great man’s human decency and continued heroic devotion to his duty. And yet he refuses to accept that Alan might be the Unknown Digger.

63 Pyke, The Annotated Letters, p. 83. One of six instances of censorship to occur in the entirety of Lewis’s penmanship. As an officer, his correspondence was rarely edited by his superiors – as a gentleman, he was expected to abide by the clearly defined rules of his position. But sometimes the only thing you can do is write it all down.

64 She specifically asked me not to say anything. Not to tell anyone. Not to worry about it – it was nothing, she says, he was drunk, she was drunk, he would never – she stops what she’s doing and looks me dead in the eye – NEVER, she says, do anything like that if he was sober.

Like that’s an excuse.

I lie in bed and argue with myself. Being drunk isn’t an excuse. Except we’ve all done things when we were drunk that we’ve regretted later. Throwing up in a best mate’s parents’ car as they drive you home. Buying that fifth round of tequila shots. Trying to backflip. But the things we regret aren’t things that hurt others, except maybe the tequila shots.

Em is taking a little time to herself. That’s for the best. I toss and turn in sweaty sheets.

When I can sleep, I dream about the night, like I had been there. Is it too much to ask for happy dreams? Ones where I wait in the dark until he finishes work, and then, as he walks to his car, I jump out with a baseball bat and smash his kneecaps until they resemble jagged shrapnel pieces through the yellowing skin, and, as he begs for mercy, I drag him over to the side of the carpark, turn him over, tell him to bite the sidewalk, and then kerb-stomp the twat? A little wish fulfilment?

I’ve not been sleeping well. I don’t know what to do.

I need to buy a baseball bat.

65 ‘Thoughts on Rising’ is one of the Unknown Digger’s more philosophical – one might even argue upbeat – poems, before the tone goes dark, as it inevitably must.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.