Rob Riel

A piece of us all is missing. Farewell to Rob Riel. Kerri Shying

'We generally notice light when it is absent'

Rob Riel, Still Life

For as Long as You Burn, Five Islands Press (new poets 6) 1999

Rob Riel’s moustache was a wonder, his poetry even more. Published in Australia, America, Canada and the UK, his stories and poetry reflected a character of bright sparks and hard work. There was nothing precious about Rob, who sported a resume as rich as Bob Dickersons – a sub-mariner, metallurgist, D.J., research fellow and all-round wage slave, he brought a wealth of experience and compassion to his plain but subtly made poetry.

So many poems to choose from.

‘My love is like a softly opened season. ‘

he writes in “Song (for Judy)”,

because Rob (uxorious Rob) was ardent about everything, a sensualist without the syrup or silliness that can sometimes mar a love poem, and it is in these (for me) he hits full belt of his range, depth and subtlety.

I’ve chosen to include probably his saltiest poem for the intensity of the emotions amid perfect control, in a wall-to-wall account of both the city we shared and a shattering bout of marital lust. It is a poem he offered to our local anthologies, so I know he liked it too.

Picaro Press, the beautiful poetry imprint Rob ran with his wife Judy Johnson, was my introduction to so many poets; not just of the Hunter either. I still own my small series including Jean Kent’s “The Spaghetti Maker”, Susan Hampton, poets I could reach out finally to touch. Rob judged me in the first poetry competition I entered in 2006, The Roland Robinson Awards, and I was daunted and delighted; I remember feeling I’d been judged by a ‘proper’ poet. And that’s what he was, a proper poet, like a singer who is on pitch. Rob’s style and voice are never laboured, nor did he strive after the fashion.

Rob’s quality of distilling the whole roiling thing (as in the poem ‘Meditation: Yellow) remains beyond my reach. I’m glad to have known him. His generosity, and his candour. I’m happier still we have the books.

If poetry transliterates to one person the experience of being another, he has left us himself, to keep.

In ‘Skin’ he writes

My words are wounds

are power

is holy…’

Love, Mid-afternoon by Rob Riel

When they make love, the whole city gentles, warm and excited. She takes him in her mouth, and skinheads throw away their small bright knives like burning things. As she strokes the length of him, lawyers put down their pens, Council workers drop their shovels and turn their faces to the sun. He comes, and policemen silence their sirens, taxi drivers forget to use their horns, delivery men refuse to reverse their trucks. When he rolls her onto her back and kisses her nipples, old women buy bags of fruit and bread, take them into the park for the birds, for homeless people. He licks her belly, and on the footpath grey men in three piece suits stop to gather litter and carry it to the nearest bin. While his tongue works between her thighs, judges pronounce mild sentences over prisoners in the dock who stand weeping for their sins. Union workmen pause to observe the bright beauty of their tools. She stiffens and trembles; insurance agents hasten to grant just claims, librarians chuckle in the stacks, schoolchildren sing with their teachers. As he enters her, shoplifters empty their pockets and purses, realtors turn off their mobiles. Each time she moans, social workers reach out to touch the unemployed on the shoulder, on the cheek. The boys in the pub lean away from their beers, stub out their smokes and are silent. They come, and suicides turn away from cliff faces and pill bottles, drug addicts break the dirty needles from their syringes and try to stand erect. Mothers lift babies from their prams and hug them. For a moment the wide city purrs softly, its great engines adrift.