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John Arthur Nichol

  • Millard Street, Drummoyne is drenched in sunshine, and scuttling with newly-minted skinks.

  • On York Street a wild-haired, angry man adjusts his red mobility scooter, sits back and shouts an obscenity. He lunges forward again, cigarette dangling from a corner of his mouth, and makes another adjustment.

  • Dark clouds above the harbour, and a crane with beacon flashing in the gloom. School uniforms crowded on a rooftop.

  • In Neutral Bay a man slips on a metal grate and his hands fly up in the air.

  • Manly Vale Golf Course: five clean white ibis graze on the rain-washed green.

  • Sunny Gelato Swirl

    A steel-coloured metal bench stands on six steel legs, on a sunlit, tiled footpath in the foreground. The bench curves at the ends, in opposite directions, so that its shadow on the footpath forms a swirling, elongated letter 'S', in shadow lines due to the many narrow, horizontal plates that form the back and base of the bench. A palm tree stands behind the bench. In the background, in deep shadow, is a shopfront with a sign saying 'Anita Gelato', and two people at a table outside.

  • Putin’s version of history is twisted
    With falsehoods, pathetically listed;
    By his logic, what’s more,
    Russia’s losing its war
    To a nation that never existed.

  • The Happiest Wall-Light

    A shiny silver light fitting set into a stained sandstone block. The fitting is circular, with the top part curving outwards, and the bottom section cut out so that it resembles a mouth stretched wide in a big, happy grin.

  • A portly man in his thirties squeezes awkwardly between the railings, clings to the top one and hangs, suspended above the path. He opens his hands and drops three inches, landing perfectly with knees bent. Straightening, he turns in triumph to his less daring partner on the ramp.

  • A small girl stands with drooping arms, like a toy put down and forgotten. She has straight, shoulder-length brown hair, a dusty pink dress, pink sandals and white socks. She watches her dad choose a trolley, and when he speaks she scuttles forward with a grin.

  • A little dog trots wilfully round its human, obliging her to rotate before continuing.

  • An unusual stroller crosses Triangle Park. It’s black all over, a sleek racing pod with big, spoked wheels at the back. Struts of metal tubing protect the seat, and micro-mesh encloses it. There’s a brand name, too, normally seen on top of cars racing to catch Australia’s two-minute ski season.

    I saw something like this in Mosman once, but it was red and contained a pair of angry Dachshunds.

  • Two people approach the top of the ramp, a mother and her toddler daughter with a topknot, yellow shorts, white t-shirt and sparkling white, velcro-strapped shoes.

    ‘Yes,’ says the mother. ‘Down.’

    The girl surges onto the ramp with a cackle, hands in the air and giggling as she tears downhill like a runaway clockwork toy, all the way to the bottom where she turns and grins with delight.

    Her mother joins her there and they set off at a sedate pace, walking on the flat. The girl falls over.

  • The Banksia Men at Neutral Bay. Do they remind you of anyone?

    The side of a building facing a square is painted with a mural from the May Gibbs books about Snugglepot and Cuddlepie. The mural shows two Banksia Men (villains, shaped as dark brown banksia pods with arms, legs and evil eyes). One lurks like a spider on a tree branch and another, glancing back the way it’s come, runs with a helpless gumnut baby clutched in its hand, dangling by its legs. Snugglepot and Cuddlepie look down from a leaf in horror. A real tree grows in front of the wall,and there are bike stands.

  • With so many men never-aftered,
    Russia’s looking for more to get shafted;
    But political stuff
    Means there’s never enough -
    Putin’s doubles are not to be drafted.

  • A Red Wall with Shadows

    A weathered exterior brick wall and all its attachments are painted entirely in red, including two metal electrical boxes, one with a flat metal plate above it) and a downpipe beside them. A vertical steel girder is bolted to the end of the wall. One square of bricks in darker red stands out and a line of cement render, also red, wobbles down beside the grider. There are cracks and dark stains here and there, especially beneath the boxes, and shadows.

  • A small boy, quiet but insistent, makes his father stop in the Dee Why Grand. The boy has light brown hair trimmed short, blue jeans and a long-sleeved pullover with blue, red and white stripes. The father passes him a shiny, vicious looking sword that bends in the middle, and the boy reaches up with both hands to slide it down the back of his pullover. First he can’t find an opening, then the sword catches. The father goes back for something they’ve dropped.

  • Coming in from the rain I encounter a banquet in a tunnel. A double line of tables runs down the centre and every chair is occupied by someone talking, shouting, laughing, eating, smiling. The roar of it fills the space and bounces off the walls and ceiling.

    Walking along the line I see that many small groups, unknown to each other, have come together in this white-tiled place between two weather-swept streets, united by their common desire for shelter, warmth and hot food.

  • Rain clatters on metal tables. Staff bang chairs into stacks. Tyres hiss on the road, and the gutters run.

  • The cafe is closing but a brown French bulldog sits in the doorway, looking out at the rain. I pause, and the dog’s face turns to stare at me. It blinks.

  • A vast hair style walks ahead of me, curly and brown, spreading like a river delta. The centre runs lighter, as if muddy foam has coalesced there, and blonde outriders are the debris that sweeps along each bank.

  • A little black poodle, legs like pipe-cleaners, trots along the path.

  • Excluded

    A street corner on a grey day with dreary light, and a big brick building across the road. On a speckled, dark footpath in the foreground, tied to a bicycle rack, is a little dog in a black coat over curly, light brown fur. He’s advanced as far as he can, with the lead at full stretch, and stands gazing forlornly towards the camera. His ears flop down at the sides.

  • For ridiculous, nothing can rival
    Putin’s Great Patriotic Revival;
    Yet there is, as he spake,
    Some existence at stake -
    Russia’s fighting for Putin’s survival.

  • Another Blind Date with a Book: King Street Newtown, Sydney

    A timber stand on a footpath by a doorway, with parked cars in the background. The stand has four narrow shelves, and each shelf holds books facing outwards, wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. The top three shelves have four books each, and the bottom shelf has two. Key phrases about each book are written on the front, like ‘Career driven vet’, ‘A June Wedding’, ‘Backstreets of Whitechapel’ and ‘War-ravaged Colonel’. A chalkboard above the stand says: ‘Blind Date with a Book!’ with a heart beside it. A “sticker beneath that says: ‘Worried you may have read it? Just bring it back (with the wrapper and receipt) and exchange for another.