Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Tuesday Poem: Return trip to the Hawkes Bay, St. Valentines Day Weekend, 2004

The first cicadas broke through
the earth’s crust
as we left home
dopey, green, flying badly.

Near Otane, on a low hill
the bungalow bent time
with its sentinel
of phoenix palms.

North of Dannevirke
cabbage trees still lined
the railway track
presenting arms.

The Bay was a basket
of apple trees
trailing wine-lovers
naked ladies in the fields.

They’re all lotus-eaters
up there you know
a friend warned us
a decade ago.

The storm broke coming back.
When we got home
cicadas chain-sawed
the wind.


Remember the Manawatu floods of February 2004? I got home from a long weekend trip to the Hawkes Bay with friends the day the rain started. The poem I subsequently wrote appears in Tongues of Ash.

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Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Tuesday Poem: Let us kneel and pray for the Belsen twin


Let us kneel and pray for the Belsen twin
From age five we trained her inner critic
We good as killed her saying good was slim

She could not stand to see her mirror-skin
You are obese and ugly answered back
Let us kneel and pray for the Belsen twin

Being fat we said’s a deadly sin
Slender body image is the ticket
We good as killed her saying good was slim

Fashion, ads, and media all weighed in
Next the Food Police helped to make her sick
Let us kneel and pray for the Belsen twin

Our culture says size zero is not thin
A minus BMI is just the trick
We good as killed her saying good was slim

Triumph over fat was a pyrrhic win
It was being thin which she could not lick
Let us kneel and pray for the Belsen twin
We good as killed her saying good was slim



I saw a clip on TV the other night which said that Vogue magazine was not going to use models who were too thin, although what this actually meant was a little vague. This new rule was optional for the other magazines published in the same stable as Vogue. This sorry little story reminded me of this villanelle I wrote a few years ago.  

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