You Looked Over Your Shoulder

When you follow the rough and rutted track
that takes you from Winton, and heads outback,
you'll come to a hollow where dinosaurs
once lived near a lake, and their feet and claws
left prints in the mud – but there's something more;
you might hear their stamping or muffled roar,
and the thunder resounding could be your heart,
or you could be hearing the stampede start…

That hollow is known and famed because
of the story it tells about dinosaurs.
We know what they did there, for quite a few
left footprints in reedbeds as they ran through
the soft boggy swampland, and milled around
as predator leaped on the prey it found
and the little ones ran in panicked fear…
if you're very quiet it's there to hear.

There are some things in life you can't explain
and dinosaur mysteries, it's very plain
could well be considered 'best left alone'
but file in your memory the soft wind's moan,
how you, at the urge of the sudden cold
looked over your shoulder at things untold;
then think on the secrets you felt and saw
when you breathed the scent of the dinosaur.