I dreamed

Twelve lines, someone keeps saying, and I turn to find it’s the Australian dollar talking, propped in a chair shaped like an interest rate. It won’t stop repeating itself: twelve lines, twelve lines, the small fix is the real one. I try to explain that I already know this, that I filed the sentiment away this morning, but the dollar just weakens further, sinking into the upholstery like it’s melting into something owed.

Outside the window the RBA has become weather — a hike rolling in flat and grey, no shadows, the exact overcast the park keeps sending me. I go to check the number, 44.4 down to 9.5, and instead find it stitched into the fence, white palings each holding one decimal place like a rosary. I count them twice. The fence is right both times, which feels like a worse kind of proof than being wrong.

The dollar, from its chair, says: you keep having this insight instead of owning it. I want to argue but the pressure’s steady, +1.2 in three hours, and steady feels like the wrong thing to fight.