Patron

You watched over me.
Adults were trustworthy then.

I liked our conversation, still do;
realised only slowly
others didn’t perceive you.

When I was 43, a magician friend
introduced me to his mentor.
You! So I learned
your name and identity.

Giver of writing, patron of poets,
great magician yourself.
And my friend; somewhat fatherly.

I’m told you are most correctly
named Tehuti, but I call you Thoth.



[Poem #52]

At the Book Fair

At the book fair
for self-published authors

my table was next to hers.
Happenstance?

We hardly stopped
talking and laughing.

She’d written her own
spiritual adventure

prose shining like poetry
in a hall of atrocious verse.

She was Crone, skinny 81,
wool cap around her ears

a light festoon of grey curls
embroidering her chin.

Age, she understood,
had made her whole.

We were sisters at once,
magickal.



[Poem #51]

Dancing Partner

Looking back I see
a thin, slightly nervous boy.
Then, I saw tall, dark, handsome
and sophisticated. I was 17.

My friend’s party.
He, new in that crowd;
me, home on holiday:
each, to each
a glamorous stranger.

They had Buddy Holly’s
latest record, Rave On,
played it over and over.
We danced. The night was warm.

But Buddy died and I
flew away, back over the sea.



[Poem #50]

Former Friend

She latched on,
I observed, to several
instant best friends.

I accepted.
So few could share
my 'spooky stuff'.

And there was her daughter,
who came this time, we knew,
to learn from me too.

Later she offered
to share a house;
it seemed kind.

By then she’d suffered –
which made her cruel
I learned.

She under-estimated.
I am soft,
not weak.

I don’t revisit
nightmares.
The end.



[Poem #49]

A Student, Years Ago

'Please,' she begged.
'Let me take it and make a copy.
I’ll bring it back soon, promise.'

I was reluctant, but
she loved it so much. Who was I
to refuse her respectful request?

Never saw her again
nor the big card from my wall
depicting the Green Lady:

Mother Gaia, crinkled old face
wise and cheery under her hood,
her smile knowing

I can still see her.



[Poem #48]

She Read Her Poem

I was lost in the beautiful words,
drifting away on them;
did wonder vaguely at a subject
with resemblances to me –
but only when others
asked, 'Did you like that?'
I emerged from reverie.
'It’s about you,' they said.

Lean, vigorous, white-haired,
she rode motorbikes in Thailand;
makes poems that experiment
with sounds, images, meanings:
witty, metaphorical, deep poems;
sometimes poems so lovely
I lose myself, carried away.



[Poem #47]

Returned Traveller

Hates Australia
land of his birth and growth,
hates Holland
land of his father's ancestry;
holds dual citizenship.
Travels as much as he can
on all continents, preferably
far from his first country.

Now he's back, in limbo,
waiting a call from elsewhere.
I wonder if he'll find himself
strangely at home
as time passes,
or will he confirm
that he's still at odds
with his own people?



[Poem #46]

My Student's Wife

Her dress is bright yellow
the colour of joy.
The metallic insets
around its neck
sparkle, and her smile
lights her whole face.

When she tells
of their new home,
what it means to them,
I see a shyness
but she speaks anyway
slowly, finding and sharing
the truth of her heart.

I think this kind, clever man
has chosen well:
a true jewel, shining
and very valuable.



[Poem #45]

Post-script: They parted some years later ... and eventually he found a new life with a new love.

Best Friend Not For Long

Big loud girl,
you took shy me
under your confident wing,
taught me things
my parents never did.

Walking home from school
you yelled at a group
in different uniform:
'Catholic dogs
sitting on logs'
then suddenly stopped
before the shouting back
and the stone-throwing could begin.

'Oh, it’s my little cousin Bevvie'
and threw your arms around her.
Even then I saw
the irony
and your oblivion.



[Poem #44]

Aunty Amy

Ugliest woman
I ever saw: stout
with mottled skin,
plain-faced even when young
in those severe photographs.
Sometimes I looked away
not to puke.

She was still the favourite
we all begged to visit;
Grandma’s spinster sister.
Grandma had seven kids,
21 grandchildren. Aunty Amy
belonged to us all.

Now my sensible shoes like hers
make me smile. Past eighty
she read everything,
loved gardening
and us all.



[Poem #43]

The Demon Benefactor

Sent an introductory
photo: himself glaring
all in black. Was he
threatening or fondling
the naked woman pinioned
by the weight of his arm?

'Bizarre,' I thought, but he
was a man of the world.
I acted cool. Then
he was charming.

Seduced by promises –
wealth, glory –
I took the bribe;
wanted it badly.
He delivered …
something. But the price!

I’d have paid evermore
boot-licking,
chastised.
No thanks.



[Poem #42]

Shelton

I like that photo
on the front of your book, mate:
head up, inhaling pleasure,
against sky and steeple.

Not a book you wrote, this time;
one we wrote for you
to attest your undying value,
returning for your life-giving words
our own, which you always encouraged.

I wasn’t there for your death
nor your wake; won’t see
this book-launch ... I’m glad
I was there in your life.



[Poem #41]

All Travellers We: Poems for Shelton Lea (Eaglemont Press) will be launched in Melbourne on August 21st.

Firstborn

I gave him something
and I’m glad I did:
some happy memories,
a love of cats and poetry.

I remember talking
in his teens and since:
quiet conversations
about ideas,
and sometimes
of turbulent feelings.

My snowy-haired
clear-eyed child,
fearless climber and diver,
grew to make poems, stories,
computer programs
and lasting friendships.

I rely on him now
for sense, honesty
and understanding;
the most fair-minded of men.



[Poem #40]

Cousin-Sister

Soon after you died, you came
to visit in my mind.
We sat together, children again,
talking as we used to
among tall ferns and grasses
and bells of pink heath
in that secret dell under the pines.

We always called it Paradise.
I wonder now if that in itself
was your message.
Otherwise we said little,
tied up a few loose ends,
agreed we were quits, grinned.



[Poem #39]

Faithful Wife

Good husband,
successful children,
comfortable home
in a posh part of town,
and still youthfully pretty.

Why that sadness
glimpsed far back in her eyes?

At last she told her story:
the first husband killed young,
no time to grieve
working to support their child.

She has no complaints.
She’s not ungrateful.
Love has lasted long this time.
It’s just, she never quite
adored him like the first.



[Poem #38]

Younger Stepson

We met at Christmas.
I guess you’d heard
there was someone new
in your father’s life.

You kissed me shyly on the cheek
and included me
in the present for your Dad:

scented bath salts.
'You might enjoy them
together,' you said.

16 years later, you’re not
slim youth but solid,
handsome man.

In one forgotten family drama
we exchanged fierce words.
Now we talk deeply,
good friends.



[Poem #37]

We no longer live near each other, but Younger Stepson is staying with his father and me this xmas, and the last line of the poem is truer than ever.

Cross-posted from my poetry blog The Passionate Crone, from whence, on 25 December 2011 (a Christmas 19 years later!) it was submitted for dVerse Christmas. 

Solzhenitsyn

Goodbye, Aleksandr,
legend of my lifetime.
Who'd have thought you would die
at 89 in your own country?

You yourself helped
to bring that about
with the smuggled book.

It seemed, after that
and your move to safety,
everything started changing.
What you brought to light
could not be re-concealed.

I read you were crusty
(surely you were entitled)
and disliked the West.
Or were you just homesick?



[Poem #36]

Ex-pat

My friend is home
after years away, years
of sudden phone-calls:
long calls, frequent, filled
with insight and strange
esoteric knowledge.

(Eventually, opinion
catches up with him.
Before that, most people
find him confronting.
But he’s here to love,
and share his wisdom.)

At our first meeting
he enjoyed my candy-striped
sneakers, my socks
with the rainbow swirls.
'That’s so cool,' he said,
laughing, in his rumbling voice.



[Poem #35]

My Friend's New Husband

'...this beautiful white-haired man
who's been sharing my bed.'

I was one of the first to know.
Initially it was their sweet secret.
(I understood, was the same
when my own lovely white-haired man....)

They’d known each other long before
their respective widowhoods,
but this new joy was sudden.

'Do you think he loves me?' she asked.
'Have you seen the way he looks at you?' I said.



[Poem #34]

Ariadne

You met me in the glade,
dressed in pale silk
blue and flowing.
Your hair fell down your back
as golden as the sunlight
that lit you from behind.
You walked towards me
slow and smiling.

Recalling your story later
I thought I understood
why it was you who came
and why you welcomed me.
Weaver with your thread,
you too were betrayed.
Yet you smile, you’re strong.



[Poem #33]