Two Kinds of Cops by Vaughan Baker follows a drought-stricken farmer whose last load of hay brings him face to face with a police officer on the streets of Warwick.
With bounced cheques behind him and hungry stock waiting at home, Phil has little left to give. What begins as a list of truck defects becomes a story about hardship, duty and the person standing on the other side of the ticket book.
Two Kinds of Cops
By Vaughan Baker
It was Phil’s last truckload of hay, to buy more time ’til rain.
He’d sourced it in the Fassifern from just below the range.
His overdraft was in default; his last two cheques had bounced,
The money used to buy the feed came from his kid’s accounts.
His old truck was in disrepair, he’d sneak through town at night.
He’d almost passed through Warwick when he saw the cop car’s lights.
The cop began to make a list of defects that he’d found,
The fines ran into thousands, and the truck he must impound.
The things Phil knew would fail were there, but also on the sheet,
A fine because his phone was placed beside him on the seat!
“You’re joking!” cried a stressed-out Phil!
“Who came up with that crap?
My phone is there so I can use the navigation app!
It guides me through these unknown streets, for here I seldom go
It may have saved an accident tonight, for all we know!
In times when drugs and race-fuelled hate weigh deep on people’s minds,
Are phones laid on the seat in sight the new benchmark for fines?!
The baldy tyres and cracked windscreen, I’ll cop those on the chin,
But this fine for my mobile means the drought will surely win!”
The cop, with everything Phil said, he secretly concurred,
But said,”I don’t make up the laws, I just enforce them, Sir.”
“At least” said Phil,” that law provides a gauge to set apart
The cops just out to raise the loot, from those who have a heart!”
The cop then caught the bush bloke’s eyes, the beaten look he wore,
His thoughts went to a past drought when he’d seen that look before;
That young man in the prime of life, with face devoid of hope…
He heard again the young wife’s cries as he cut down the rope.
He stopped, then tore the ticket up, with heightened pride, because
The mobile phone test had confirmed, which kind of cop he was!
Keeping The Verse Alive
Two Kinds of Cops is shared with permission from Vaughan Baker through Keeping The Verse Alive, Country Campfire’s bush poetry preservation project.
By preserving poems like this, we’re helping ensure the stories, humour and characters of country Australia continue to be enjoyed for generations to come.
Vaughan Baker
Grazier • Bush Poet • Heritage Custodian • Poultry Breeder
Vaughan Baker has spent more than half a century working sheep country near Thallon, Queensland, and retirement has done little to slow him down. Between his Merinos, Foxtukka Freerange Fancy Fowls and preserving Old Bullamon Homestead, he still finds time for a bush yarn carrying the humour and characters of life on the land.
Poems, recitals, photographs, stories and original works remain the property of their original creator and are shared by Country Campfire with permission.
