Joan Sedorkin

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Dharma for Joan Sedorkin

 

five years ago she came to the art class I ran

with five different groups over four years

Joan came to the first and stayed till the last

it was two years before she told me she’d read

‘On The Road’ in 1958 and with a girlfriend hitched

north from Sydney n stopped at Cairns

met and married a Russian fisherman

made a home raised a family buried a husband

 

Then - aged seventy-eight she left Cairns

with two suitcases

to get away from demands of family

‘to find her self’

moved into a rooming-house in Brisbane

started to paint and write haiku

 

we had both lived a life knee-capped

by low self-esteem non existent self confidence 

but over the years I’d learned how

to change that handicap

n learned how to dismantle

its power bit by bit

n I showed her how to do it

 

later I found out she was blind

in one eye - sight failing in the other

no wonder she couldn’t draw details

then an Indian doctor and laser surgery

restored the sight in her good eye

enter a king-tide of wild colour like a sudden burst

of parrakeets among a crush of blue blossoms

 

I watched her discover a sense of her Self

n become a terrific painter

she drew with an intoxicating fragile line

self-confident

admiring of her own work

no longer putting it down

 

her death a few months ago affected me

more than I would have thought

 

Dharma Bums was her favourite Kerouac book

for her I later wrote of the silent encounter

I’d had with Gary Snyder

her favourite poet

in a bar in Melbourne

in the later years of my alcoholism 

Karl Gallagher, 2000

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A GHOST BETWEEN US (for Joan Sedorkin)

Around 1980, aged 37 I was standing
at the bar of the Albion in Carlton
taking notice of nobody
watching life passing by the window
in the early afternoon drinking alone
although several friends were around

I was away with my own thoughts
so long as I had a drink in front of me
and one on the way
that's all i really cared about.

Jukebox sounds came from the back bar
I was lightly swaying to the music
friends passed by saying hallo
smiling generously I replied
feeling good man feeling good
but I was disinterested

interested only in myself
listening to some hidden beat
some universal soul
alone in a crowded bar.

A voice I hadn't heard in years said
'Hey Karlos how are you man.'
I turn and face Nigel a sydney poet who's
grinning grabbing my arm telling me he's
here for the poetry festival
talking loud he says
'Why don't you say hallo to Gary Snyder, over there.'
which I don't believe but look anyway
I see two guys nearby leaning against the wall
drinks in hand watching me
one I recognise from photos as Snyder

it dawns on me

that maybe they have been there

for some time
for how long?
I've been at the bar for over an hour.

We are about eight feet apart
and for a few seconds our eyes lock
and suddenly I feel ashamed to be seen
getting drunk
alone in a crowded bar
at mid day

disinterested in the company of others.

I felt the ghost of Kerouac pass between us
Snyder takes it in
sees a well liked guy
sees that I am on the same greased slide
of alcoholism
that took Jack down
the path of bitter loneliness

the scrambled brains
the mindless bad mouth
the deep disconnection
the desolation

I didn't go over and say hallo
we both knew what we had seen
I turned back to the bar
picked up my drink, downed it
and ordered another.

karl gallagher
[13/10/00]

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