Possum (June)

Playing possum means pretending you’re dead, useful knowledge when reading Eliot. Rousing the possum is its opposite, Australian for livening things up, creating controversy. This June Saturday, my midwinter visit to the barber, provides other possibilities for ‘possum’. The haircut in the chair expounds: “So she says, my neighbour, can you do something about your possums? MY POSSUMS! She says, those possums come over from your fruit trees. You need to get rid of them. So I say, they live in your roof. They’re not my possums. She says ‘your possums’! They’re her possums.” Possums themselves elude this anthropomorphic roundabout.  

Possum (April)

Pound called Eliot ‘Old Possum’, southern American short for their native opossum, because he pretended to look dead even though he was alive. The marsupials that clatter rowdily over our roof at three in the morning are not Eliots. They scramble along gutters. They hiss and lunge. The eucalyptus is stripped of foliage. One lemon tree is ruined and they threaten another. Cruel April! On Myers-Briggs they are bang rather than whimper types. All of this leads to some overwhelming question. Have they never heard of the still point of the turning world? They rub their backs against the windowpanes.