Totara

I wrote you five-lined poems on rimu tabloids
Placed them in the hollowed out remains of old anthologies
Irish Poetry Before Yeats,
John Donne
And of course my favourite of Heaney's

And with them the
Seeds of many sorts plundered from our gardens,
Your gardens.
I used flax strips to bind them shut and I hung them
In the cooling shade of the Totara tree.

In the cooling shades of the Totara tree
I had hung my last three books
Of read and re-read beloved poetry
Hollowed out of words and bound by tied flax
Seed-cases of the years.

My poems to you fell over that Winter
And lay upon the barked woodfloor
In the Spring seed shoots appeared but
It was dark and soon they too were unseen.
I still go there now, listen to the winds' recital.

Note: Totara, and Rimu are both trees native to New Zealand

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Biography

Born at home Finglas, Dublin, in 19'67. Youngest of five sons. Left for London '88 Met a Kiwi Left for NZ 93...Living on a 5 acre hobbyfarm with our four young sons Ruari, Cian, Finn and Tadhg . Happy as a piglet in ****