Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Friendly Street Poets | FSP Tuesday 2nd November Poetry & Poppies


Friendly Street Poets | FSP Tuesday 2nd November Poetry & Poppies

Thank you for the photograph from the artist Davena Hooson.

The only poem I can even remotely claim as a Remembrance Poem is this one, written some years ago from my humble Daglish flat opposite a spacious park.

On the Third Day

In the first days of winter
mushrooms pop-up like
childhood toys in
the manicured park:

white domes with no
‘use by’ on them, no bar-codes
for value judgement. In the wetness
and warmth they grow as dogs
trot by with their gossiping owners.

A tiny Vietnamese lady crosses the street
wearing a brilliant yellow anorak,
bucket and trowel in hand. I watch.
She knows the ways of survival,
she harvests every last dome.

Passing schoolchildren point
and laugh, but she hears kookaburras
high in the gums. Winter’s false start
brings her back for three mornings. I wait
and harvest her across busy lanes of traffic.

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