Dreams

I meet old school friends
in a house owned by a collector of rocks
The house is familiar
and I know I have been there before.

I am driving down a country road
in the summer looking
for a shop
that sells dogs.

I am at the top of wooden stairs
watching a dark haired little girl
with the whitest of teeth
and the reddest of dresses walk towards me.

I am in a boat
with an ex boyfriend
sailing in the darkness
towards a party in the forest.

Needs

A maddening thirst
for knowledge,
…enlightenment

All encompassing hunger
for food,
…love

A beleaguering urge
to write,
…create

An aching desire
for sex,
… you

Gentle obsessions

A seventy eight year old lady,
Daphne lived in a state house in St Johns.
She would go shopping
only on a Tuesday.
The food was fresher
on a Tuesday she said
and the taxi driver she liked
was on duty.
She was meticulous
when she chose her vegetables.
The kumara had to be the right shape
so she could hold it
in her small hand to peel.
It had to be smooth, no bumps
so the peeler would slide over it.
Her kitchen cupboards
were scrupulously organised.
She would obsessively nest
her precious china from big to small,
like shape in like shape,
less chance of chipping she said.
Her wardrobe was similarly ordered.
The coat hangers were all the same,
covered in cream satin over foam and
every fifth one had a tiny sachet
of lavender hanging from it.
Dresses, skirts, and blouses were all
sorted according to colour,
her shoes sat neatly on shoe trees,
and her handbags were
lined up by size
on the top shelf.
I hear Daphne died.

Another day

An old green Vauxhall velox with its
bonnet of orange and its boot tied down with string
veers off the northwestern motorway
its wannabe hippy driver not sure of where he’s going

An 8 year old blonde boy
big for his age, stubs his toe
as his ‘friend’ teases him for being fat
He swears at his teacher and cries

An old small stooped lady
halts the Auckland peak hour traffic
with her hand as she crosses the road
20 feet away from a pedestrian crossing

A young woman clasps herself with delight
when she is rung and invited for an interview
for a job in a company
where her boyfriend works

An old oak tree which has stood for 130 years
divests itself of one of its four branches
in the dark of the night
while no one is watching

God

Morning arrives
I return from the bathroom
after washing off yesterday
and pull up the Holland blind
that you used as a canvas
for painting god
He spins around the roller
then I put on my makeup
get into my office clothes
and step into today

Fauxhemian Ways

To fit in socially you:
wear a pair of ripped jeans;
affect a “don’t give a toss” air;
pay for a small tattoo;
buy drugs from the cute guy at work;
dye your hair in odd colours;
start reading beat poetry;
and consider purchasing
a parrot for your shoulder.

Paice Ave Expats

Listening to blues on black vinyl,
playing bass on the bed.
Flatmates philosophising
and meaningfully organising
blue meany mushroom party posters
to glue to any city flat surface.
Kittens and cats clambered couches
and lentil stews simmered slowly.
We shared beds, plants, trips, cars,
angst, anxiety, laughs, love and life.
We were free, frivolous and flatting.

Winter holiday

The sunny season is winding up,
the evenings are drawing in.
The sound of Jack Johnson
meanders through the open window
while you weed
and trade chat about plans
for summer holidays in winter.
I dream of a translucent warm sea
with a surfeit of tropical fish.

You pull out our agapanthus,
no more will its bent seedheads
bob in the evening’s humidity.
Even the vibrancy of the calla lilies
are consigned to wither
in the heat of the compost.
Like these flowers will in days,
Jack’s song fades as we
envision warmth in winter.

Megan

It seems
like just
the other day
when you would sit
in your jewel
coloured silk scarves
on your blue
cushion covered sofa
and chat to me,
your granddaughter,
about the news,
art, poetry
travel and love
with your sparkling
alive vibrancy
and gesticulations
that so piqued my
curiosity.
Your colourful home
overflowed with
secretive little
draws and cupboards
filled with ivory
treasures and
objects with her stories
and histories
gathered on trips
and life's other journeys.
Original paintings
and family photos
were crookedly
hung on
every spare piece
of wall,
shelves with books
on every subject
took up every other
space; tidiness was
never one of
your priorities.
Bright, scented
lilies sat in
blue and purple vases
on tables whose
legs stood on
exotic persian rugs.
Your life was full.

I visited you
yesterday on your
85th birthday.
You wore
pastel coloured
synthetic clothing
that someone else
had bought.
You sat still
while your hands
picked obsessively
at a non-existent
piece of fluff
on a pale
pink chair
against
insipid walls
hanging faded copies
of someone elses
bad artwork.
Your available reading
material was
Readers Digest
Condensed books
or outdated womens
magazines.
Fake pallid flowers
filled a white vase
on your immaculately
tidy white dresser
that sat
on the beige carpet.
Your eyes
are still bright,
your smile
still beautiful,
but you are now unable
to complete a sentence
and I can see how hard
you are trying to
retrieve those
slippery memories
of who I am
and who you are.

Sometimes

a
cache of
pleasure moments is

required so I
can retrieve
them

Growing up too fast

I watch you
as your drunken mother
staggers amongst
the crowd of
rock music diehards.
Her tired shoes
which you
clutch in your hand
are the least
of your burden.
Your ten year old body
bends with the weight
of anxiety
and the backpack
carrying promises
and food.
Your eyes dart
with embarrassment
as she weaves
back and forth.
Your plea
of desperation
"can we please go home"
not heard
over the crowd,
the music and her
oblivion.

Alone

As he moves
he bundles it up -
the flotsam, jetsam
of thoughts, letters,
photos, and the sleeve
from the t-shirt of a
good lover.
Old jewellery
and some gold jewellery
gets tangled up
amongst itself
He is reluctant
to relinquish
the bundles and tangles
scared that in doing
so a piece of himself
might also go missing
Like others, he seeks
someone who
will finally look, really see,
truly know, wholly love
what he has been,
what he is carrying,
who he is now,
and will accept and cherish
the bundles and tangles.
Turning the corner
along the street of
aloneness he
finally recognises
who that person is.
In the reflection
in the glass
on the other side
of the road
is a man
with a bundle of tangles

Change of Heart

She reached premises
based on promises
made when love
was in bloom

life changing moves
were then effected
and then he
changes his tune

How can she dance
to this new song?
Listening to lyrics that
hurt heart and sear soul.

Holiday Weekend

The water flows in
and flows out
washing the plastics,
and glass from city
boatie’s picnics
to this night’s tideline.

The island's seaweed
heaves and sighs
while in the distance
phosphorescence glistens
in the enlightening evening.

I also sigh
as the gibbous moon
droops over the sea
pointing towards a return
to the throng
of the metropolis.
This is the last night
of a perfect island
summer holiday retreat.

New School

I
made a
decision in May

basing
your future
on my current

dreams.
My hopes
beget your change.

Changes

Memories hang
among cobwebs
while tuis
play in the
growing pohutukawas
of your youth's
garden of kisses.

I move treasures
gathered from
the beach
of your past,
to dust
the shelves.
I rearrange the shells,
beginning
to make
my mark.
I can hear
the southwest wind
as it whips up
its whitecaps
on the deep
veridian hauraki gulf
carrying the future
to the clay cliff
doorsteps
of your heart's home

On the bench

You are spent now
your years of youthful charisma
and man about town popularity
wearied by age and tan suits.

To go with the tan suit
you wear a garish red necktie
(who dressed you this morning?)
trying to collar the power
that your charm
once proffered.
Not grasping the
fashion of the day,
another symptom
of loss.

In your day you strutted
and women did a double take
then swooned
in discordant competition.
(At least you think they did)

Today you sit
melancholic on a bench
during corporate lunchtime
while sexy young things
walk past
no heads swivelling
except yours

Cool grass

She
eschews shoes,
feet baring witness

Dissonance

You
scope out
the social landscape

calibrating
interaction's risk
with paranoia's perception

Hakanoa Street

When
living northern
hemisphere winter afternoons

I
would recall
Hakanoa Street summers

offering
shade sheltering
Plane tree leaves

to
the suburban
heat's asylum seekers