New Zealand Poetry

comet*

our dad would
tell us his
mother held
him in her
arms i wonder
what sleeves
what frilled
cuffs telling
him that star
out there a
kerosine lamp
in god’s hand
on the dark
of the invercargill
night was
haley’s comet
and he would
remember it
he did
we do

the comet
goes on
us too
i believe
the turn
of a life
in its
years
out and
back

a ‘dad in arms’
i smile
to
see

beijing
october 2011

 

*my father was born in 1906. He remembered his mother holding him on the balcony of their house in Invercargill and telling him that the brilliant star out on the night was ‘Haley’s comet’ and that he would remember this moment his whole life. That must have been the comet-sighting in 1910 meaning he was four at the time. The comet returns every 75 or 76 years, and he passed away in his 76th year.

Steam and stains

pave the way

for the late man,

whisky breath,

yesterday’s hangover.

He has been out

hunting for headlines.

His are buried in doubles,

grasped with a tremble.

He is sought – now.

There he is, in the lane

where hustlers hide

in the falling cold.

Snap the red door,

get up the endless steps.

Front pages come this way,

squiggles and lines, tatty pages.

They are dressed, primped.

The late man does that.

A rye eye on the words,

a flick of the wrist

Without a skinned nose,
ostriches – the lucky
ones,
that reliance has not graced
upon staggered
lines of feet,
the worm-like
growing
by
the warehouse
road front
where the humble waits,
and fear
becomes the heavenly home
you leave.

Go on and roll the tints up
in the window, block the embers
losing glow
for unforeseen
misfortune.

There’s oblivion
for comfort, hope, for not yet
zero self esteem.
Even after
it is
5 O’clock
there is no dream,
and there is
never
enough.

© A2Kdavis (K Davis) 2017

sum

the sum
of love
is never
lost
though
death tears
the page
across
burns
the simple
symbols of
its gathering
tear kiss
and hand
the heart’s
forms to
ash

the sum
of love
is never
subtracted
from

Were it not for the silver-plate teapot,

the sky reflected on its creased flank,

you would not know the grave was there.

It is just a bed of pale dirt, seed striking

among the scratchings of a little bird.

This, though, is a fine place to lie;

where any wind makes the trees shout,

where you can hear the river’s swell

and feel the rust on wrought iron.

He lived here all his life –

just across the road.

His was a little house with a tiny porch.

It had no frills, and neither he.

He sought nothing more than sun and food,

a place to lie old his head.

He walked the square section,

thought a garden would be nice.

Not that he bothered.

He did make tea, though.

It was always his hand on the pot.