Riches and Poverty Theme Analysis

I love this place.
I love the flow of cold clear water
over the rocks
and the wattles on the bank
and the lizards sunbaking,
heads up, listening,
and the birds,
hundreds of them,
silver-eyes and currawongs,
kookaburras laughing
at us kids swinging on the rope
and dropping into the bracing flow.
I spent half my school days here
reading books I’d stolen
from Megalong Bookshop
with old Tom Whitton
thinking I’m his best customer
buying one book
with three others shoved up my jumper.
I failed every Year 10 subject
except English.
I can read.
I can dream.
I know about the world.
I learnt all I need to know
in books on the banks
of Westfield Creek,
my favourite classroom.

[…] I settle down
with a book about these kids
stranded on a deserted island
and some try to live right
but the others go feral
and it’s a good book
and I’m there, on the island
gorging on tropical fruit,
trying to decide
whose side I’m on.
And then it hits me.
I’m on neither.
I’d go off alone,
because you can’t trust
those who want to break the rules
and you certainly can’t trust
those who make the rules,
so you do the only thing possible,
you avoid the rules.
That’s me,
on the deserted island
of a soft lounge
in Bendarat Library.

I don’t need to work at McDonald’s.
Dad would rather I didn’t.
He buys me anything I want.
But Mum and I have a deal.
Whatever I earn, she doubles
and banks for me,
for university in two years.
Dad says why bother.
Dad is too rich for his own good.
It was his idea I go to
Bendarat Grammar School
instead of Bendarat High School
where all my old friends went.
[…]
And I can’t wait for university
so I can leave home
and that’s why I work at McDonald’s
and mop floors.

I stuffed the notes
into my jacket pocket
and walked into town.
I thought of what to do
with all this money—
a big meal at a restaurant,
some clothes,
a new sleeping bag,
a radio for the long nights,
and then I realized
how Old Bill felt—
with nothing
you’re rich.
You’ve got no decisions,
no choice,
and no worry.
Here I am walking
in the sunshine of another day
buying the world
and worrying over choices
I didn’t have to make a week ago.
I wanted to spend the money
quickly
so I could go back to nothing,
go back to being rich
and penniless again.

It’s simple, really.
I have more clothes
than I’ll ever wear.
I have a TV and a CD player
in my room
which has its own bathroom
which is always a mess
full of make-up and lip gloss
and moisturizer and special soaps.
I have a large desk with a computer
and next month,
when I turn eighteen,
my own bloody car.
And I’m not a spoilt brat OK,
but I am spoilt,
spoilt to boredom,
and I’m smart enough
to realise that none of this
means anything
except my parents are rich
and think I want this stuff
or need this stuff
and I know what I really need
and it’s not in my bedroom.
And it’s not able to be bought
in any damn store.

I’ve got the weekend off.
No McDonald’s,
no schoolwork,
and thankfully no parents—
Mum has a conference interstate,
with Dad going along
‘for the golf’.
It only took three days
of arguing to convince
Mum and Dad that, at seventeen,
I can be trusted on my own,
even though I can’t.
And what is trust, anyway?
No, I won’t burn the house down.
No, I won’t drink all the wine.
No, I won’t have a huge drug party.
But
yes, I will invite Billy over
and yes, I will enjoy myself
in this house,
this big, ugly, five-bedroom
million dollar brick box
that we live in.

I sat through Maths
and Science
and English
trying to understand why I ran
and all I can think
is that seeing Billy
with that old hobo
made me think of Billy
as a hobo
and I was ashamed,
ashamed of myself
for thinking that.
Hadn’t I known how Billy lived?
Hadn’t I seen him
stealing food,
and hadn’t I seen where he sleeps?
By lunchtime
I decided
I was a complete fool
and maybe I was more spoilt
than I thought,
maybe there was something
of my parents in me,
whether I liked it or not.
And I walked through the school gates,
and I walked slowly and deliberately
back to the railway tracks,
determined not to run away again.

I almost laughed
when they arrived.
The two neatest hobos
I’d ever seen,
with their hair combed,
slicked back,
and their faces rubbed shiny clean.
Old Bill called me ‘Miss’
and offered me a box of chocolates
he’d brought
and he looked around the house
as though he were visiting the moon.
Billy saw the wine,
already open,
and he poured three glasses
passed them around
and as we raised our glasses
Billy said,
‘To the richest house in Bendarat’
and we laughed.
My cooking even smelt good […]

Caitlin and I lay
in the huge bed
with the moon
a perfect light
and the trees
long fingers scratching
at the window.
I reached under the bed
and found what I’d hidden
earlier in the night.
I lifted the small case
and I opened the lid
to show Caitlin the
beautiful green emerald ring
I’d bought months earlier
because of the colour of her eyes
because I’d worked all week
in the cannery with my hands stained red
and because
I couldn’t spend all that money
on food,
or beer,
or myself.