Tennant Creek Drive -In

Help me somebody

The walls are closing in

And sharks are biting my shins

Because of the Tennant Creek Drive-In

You remember, when we got in for free

Because dad was a Apex Club member

And it was his job to run the projectors

Carbon rods burning white hot

While the town scowled in the dark

We saw such terrible and wonderful things

In the back of our Holden station wagon

Where we were meant to fall asleep

But we didn't

The best and worst of 70's

Exploitation Cinema

Was our dreamscape

While our mum waited for the gig to end

As she had done ever since her 19th year

We saw, while peaking over back seats,

Wild animals ripping people to shreds

People being shot, disemboweled, decapitated,

Blown up, stabbed, invaded by parasites

Maybe a 5 year-old shouldn't be seeing this?

I asked my mum, years later, once my daughter was born

Her advice on raising children.

She said: You pretty much raised yourselves

Did we?

Maybe I should write a how-to book
That takes a long hard look
At how to raise kids free of nightmares
Page one would probably begin:
Don't take your 5 year-old
To the Tennant Creek Drive-In.

© shaun patrick green 2018