Leaving Wellington (Holly Larsen)

Not leaning over
a collapsing box
picking through
ill fitted and
musty cloth with
secret holes that
let in pennies of cold
where neat seams
should be

No more taking
you home to re-hem
air out in the sun
and hoping you keep
your shape

Let those who care to mend
have their find

I want
a brand new love

Forbearing (Chris Parsons)

Proudly claiming this tall tree,

swaying in its giddy height,

but unhappy in his shade.

I’m still struggling to keep

up with my father’s shadow.

His arm heaping concrete along

the mountain chains, raking great

slips of gravel off crumbling

hills. His shovel swallowing beaches

of sand. His tendon’d arms

and great leathered hands

remolding this earth into God’s

own country, hidden in the

folds of the pacific’s emerald

gown. Now we’re left here

waiting by the grey stumps,

gathering sticks for the small

fires. Feeling those cold world

winds, looking up and trying

to re-stitch this sacred canopy.

Lunch Break (Matthew Wright)

Weathered overalls

And yellow hard hats

Smoke cigarettes

Berate colleagues

And tell stories

Often heard

Yet always applauded

They, watch marshmallows drop

And foam rise

Suits and stockings

Single file

Advance forward, steadily

To see

Their names in print

Or safety nets torn, mended

Or perhaps

To see who tells the jokes

And who are

The punch lines

Meanwhile

Men, and Woman

Pull in nets

As Perspiration, and fish guts

Combine a scent

As welcome as the melting marshmallows

And warm editions

A Man with best friend

Head into hills

Long before the bottles delivered

And the papers stacked

They return after

The printers re-fire

And signs dragged indoors

The Men and Woman meet,

As friends wait on flat decks

Or through cracked windows

Tongues waving in the breeze,

They smoke cigarettes

Berate mates

And tell stories

Often heard

Yet always applauded

Sullenly at Molyneaux Bay and Elsewhere (Jack Bradshaw)

To Hone,

The friend who convinced me normality is not so hot

But poetry is…

A skylark above the Catlins pours out its song

The tide licks at the road along Molyneaux Bay

Sullenly without yesterday’s winter sun

Lightening the village’s ascent from beach to peak

Unrepenting the tide hisses at the road head-on

Pushing it closer by the day to the church

And the woman mowing beneath its yellow sides

The last voice to reach the pew by the door

Asked for a reasonable offer to start the bids

A visitor wonders how much is an old church worth

Sombre bush spills over rounded hill and gentle slopes

Where natives fell in headlong rush before axe and fire

And men and animals sucked the land of life

Poets and writers inhabit this chocolate box countryside

Neighbours to cows contained in tree-lined symmetry

Churning their bed of winter mud for the night ahead

The tramper climbs the fence to drink but shies away

Where hoofmarks merge with rancid silt and turbid waters flow

And trout and whitebait struggle against the odds

Skylarks as far as North Cape take up a song that varies little

the drop – te rerenga wairua* (Peter Le Baige)

it’s steep

from here on

rock

tree

ocean

that one

pohutukawa

holding out on

rock against the

sight of ocean

in its branches

vivid in shadow

against the

wind-flustered

sea

cat’s-paws

swells

the surf

feeding on

the silence

between

its comings &

goings

you could drop

right through

this to fall

into the cold

roilings of the

tide find

yourself at

the edge

of memory

a spit of sand

long each

grain a colour

of things known

of dawns in

the hands

of love

stars going

out on the

breeze

you could drop

right through

this skin

that sky

on edge

where the sea

tips over

drop through

the distance

to where

the last rocks

norwest

are clotted

against the

tidal rips

anchored out

in sheer memory

of our having

been

you could drop

right through

the twisting heart

of the waters

below the undertow

of kelp taking

you down in

the murk

of this

life as it

comes away

from your

self the tern

pitched sharp

down into

the waves

closing the hunt

on the fish

underneath

the silver

leaves of

our days

you could

drop right

through

*meaning ‘the leaping place of the spirits’, the place in the Maori world where the souls of the dead take leave of Aotearoa