Phar Lap behind glass

After Peter Porter’s Phar Lap in the Melbourne Museum

In his cabinet of glass and wood

I had thought Phar Lap was all original

fittings and sockets, displayed so the devoted

might venerate his uncorrupted corpse.

The scent of wood and recycled air

a kind of saintly odour. I was ignorant

that his parts had been consigned to different places—

his heart to Canberra,

his bones to Wellington—

dismembered like the arm and toes of Francis Xavier.

All that remained of authenticity was his hide,

stretched over a metal, wood and burlap frame.

Twenty years on, I observe

the wrinkled fetlocks where gravity

has taken its toll, the eyes

and harness that need slight adjustment—

minor flaws, really

when each vein and ridge and line

is carefully crafted to suggest

an animal ready to bolt. The hunter’s clip

shaved into his chestnut coat, the scarring

where the saddle rubbed against his withers—

markings

of the one true hide.

In this part of the museum, partitioned

like a chapel, visitors circle and stare

at the flared nostrils, the sheer size

and commanding stance—

the glass fingerprinted, as if through touch

comes intercession with the sacred.