As I write down the sentences, mentally compose them and then read them off, they begin to break off like huge chunks of glacial ice, the row of type – the glacier’s cliff face at the water. And gradually the whole thing is cracked up and sinking into the water. It reminds me of Splendide-Hotel by Gilbert Sorrentino, partly because he writes about language and partly because he uses the words “glacial ice palaces”.

The words “yellow straw hat” against an orange background, “the woman is standing at the end of the garden in the sun”. And the orange background becomes the blackening arctic sky as the sentence collapses. “The woman walks down the small concrete path towards us, taking off her yellow straw hat in one sweeping movement of her hand”. It is like slow motion on a day which is warm and still, with the sounds of a few insects here and there. “She takes off her hat. It is hanging down at her side against her floral dress with the ribbons touching the ground. She has reached the door of the garden shed and goes in”.

I imagine a book like a dictionary of phrases and sentences, divided into sections according to a system I’ve never seen before, a unique system which lists the various components of every possible sentence. Like a film of a woman walking down a concrete path towards you and very close, takes off her hat in one sweeping movement of her hand, and takes off her hat in one sweeping movement of her hand, again and again. And you focus on her armpit, the movement of her loose-fitting floral dress

A voice across the water. Saussure, saussure. Open the door and the city noise thumps in. The heat, the scent of the jasmine plant on the balcony. Where the iguanas play. The carpet. The moon on your head. The swimming pool, valium, bottles of scotch, make-up, colours like turquoise, powder blue. Bodies in the bed, waking up with the sun. The whiteness of the kitchen, the bathroom. The overpowering excitement – the days, the nights of the city sparkling at your feet and the expanse between to fly out in. Summer. The screeching of the doors, the hugging in the lift. Running through the building in a swimming costume, out into the hot morning where the asphalt is still cold. Talking and talking till you’re hoarse, relieved by the breeze blowing over your back and swimming up and down the pool. Across the water the voice, I’d rather be sloppy drunk. Summer floods through here again and sweeps away the cold. Music, the dancing. Long green glasses of creme de menthe and lemonade. Cans of beer littering the balcony and Irish coffee first thing, blinking and wet in the sunlight. Talking of boats in the New Hebrides, living with natives in South Africa, doing the 4-minute mile, passing notes to lesbians at parties, burying the bottles in the bushes, and joint after joint, the phone rings constantly. Going, going where, to Morocco, Algiers, Casablanca, Castella Rosso, the most exotic places. Colour tv, Don Lane and his glittering array of guests. On the balcony are orange flowers, masses of white flowers, a tree fern. Below, the parked cars jut out from the building like teeth, orange, blue and white. The terraced houses down the hill. The bay, the city and before, you, the wide open sky and the sun rising, with radiance. Iguanas and nights stream out over your naked back.

The yacht is sitting on the water, it seems as though on the very surface of it. Its hull is white and slender and low on the water. It is moored to an orange ball just off the shore of the island. Close to it is a wide wooden jetty with pieces of scrap iron and timber planking. Across the water is the mainland. The white two-storey hotel with its grass beer garden like a small promontory and blue and white Cinzano umbrellas and white plastic tables. Casual but exclusive.

Vegemite labels in a row, huge and jarless.

Two people curled around each other on a motorbike whizzing around a corner at night. The bike goes over on its side and out of sight.

A faint bubbling sound of boiling water on the stove. The cat squatting on the small table. The lid.

The car has come, another car is driving away. Footsteps down the path. The water is bubbling, the typewriter is ready to go.

Ken is going to walk down the path soon. The bubbling sounds like his footsteps at the beginning of the path. The cars sound like his car.

The cat is resting now with its head on its paws.

In the expressionist painting, the people on the motorbike are being sucked into the darkness by the eddy of lines.

The dashboard of the car softly lights up the faces of the driver and the passenger. The passenger is telling a story. My parents spent fifteen years wandering like nomads up and down the north coast. My father arranged bingo nights and dances from town to town. My mother was a dressmaker. They were quite old when I was born, they weren’t intending to have any children. So that’s how I came into the world and of course they had to settle down then. The road gently twists and turns through rolling hills of grass paddocks. Sheep country. The moon appears at the horizon and the paddocks grow pale.

The two white chiffon curtains are being blown into the room by the wind from the open window. They are twisting like cigarette smoke and obscure the view which is of a hazy grey block of a building. Through the open doorway to the next room can be seen a mirror which reflects the mattress on the floor and some pillows, sheets and clothes. There is a small tinkling sound and then a door closing softly. The curtains are blowing over the table just touching the top of a glass without moving it.

Underneath the grass is a piece of orange plastic. An old cup. The grass is green on top and brown underneath and around the edges. Ants weave around on the concrete path in the sun. At the end of the garden is a woman in a straw hat drenching the hydrangea bushes with water from a hose. A children’s picture book made of cloth is lying on a chair near her. The woman has large soft arms and is wearing a loose green and white striped dress. She stops watering and walks to the shed. After turning off the tap she sweeps her hat off her head to her side in one slow movement. Dreaming. Of the creamy sand at the beach, lying shoulder to shoulder laughing, looking at the froth rising up the beach towards them. A small child is sitting naked on a blanket holding some sand tightly in his fist.

Across the bay a shadow of a cloud has settled on the strip of city between the bay and the sky. Below the balcony on a small strip of grass by the driveway some children are looking for their ball. A cold wind starts to blow into the balcony. On the side of an office block in the city, there is a reflection of the sunset and it is growing a darker burning orange. Inside the flat, it is quiet except for the sound of the lift and the crash of the fire door on the stairs. A neighbour arrives home and opens a door. There is a brief sound of voices and a rustling of packages, then the door closes.

“Come on the yacht, come on the yacht.”
“You know, if you’re thinking something you don’t want to think, you don’t have to think it. Or if you want something you haven’t got, you can get it, you can. Every night before you go to sleep, close your eyes and imagine a cabinet filled with bottles. Take down the bottle which contains what you want and pour it into your hand. If you do this every night, the thing you want, it can be anything, will just crop up sometime.”
“Will I smash this bottle on the prow?”
“Let’s swim to the beach. Have you ever done any skin diving? It’s another world under the water.”
“Isn’t this an amazing boat, look at that mast.”
“What were you talking about?”

“When?”
“Just then, just then, about going to sleep.”
“We’re going now, come on, don’t you want to.”
“I’ve got something to smoke here. Would you like some, it’ll get rid of your headache. You shouldn’t get those you know. I never get them. Have you ever done yoga? It always takes me a long time to do this. That sail’s flapping a lot.”
“What’s this”
“What do you think, ha ha.”
“Have you ever seen phosphorescence, or whatever it’s called. We could look for it tonight, but you don’t see it everywhere, do you. I can’t remember what causes it. One time I saw it and it was all over the water, thousands of little flashes.”
“That’s what it’s like up here at night, even on the land. Everything’s always incredibly black with just some moonlight, or just a few lights on the other shore. When I stay up here for a while, it must be the silence or just being away from the things I’m used to, I get disoriented and feel a bit as though I’m just floating about. And I find myself doing things without thinking about it, things just occur to me, sometimes thoughts, which seem to come from nowhere. Like phosphorescence, it isn’t from fishes is it, it’s some kind of chemical in the water, but it looks magical.”