Acceptable Losses

Words & Music: Pat Drummond (3.47)

The Road To Omeo/Acceptable Losses

For Mikla Lewis, Jeff Angel, Valerie Thurlow,

and all those who founded and work for WIRES (Wildlife Rescue Service)

Dateline: Alpine National Park Omeo, Victoria 3/1/97

On The Road to Omeo

that's where she lost her life

The thing was huge she could not move

blinded by the light

A rush of wind, a whimpering,

a final flash of pain

Warm blood on the bitumen

and death in a table drain

Chorus: Now sightless eyes stare out into a starless sky

till the meat ants dance their dance

again on her in the morning light.

On bones picked clean they leave no dreams

of ecstasy or pain;

warm blood on the bitumen

and death in a table drain.

On a patch near Granite Flat

She was born and partly raised.

She grew on National Parkland grass

the stock had never grazed.

A velvet face, the speed and grace

so natural to her kind but

a speed, in fact, that was no match

for the thing that ran behind.

Acceptable Losses. Accorded no crosses,

and if we ever count the cost

The case is run for the damage done.

Never for the ones that are lost

Acceptable Losses. Accorded no crosses.

Tell me, what is an acceptable loss?

It's not a term that I've heard used

by those whose lives are lost.

Chorus: