and there's a long hot day ahead.
I shall lie in the shade and pass the hours
listening to the sound of laughter from the kitchen
and watch a kingfisher search the rockpools
and catch the green glint of sunbirds
as they flit from flower to flower.
I would like to try and catch some words
the way I used to
and arrange them in some pattern
of sound and shape
that I found pleasing.
That's all.
Not much, but now
it seems harder to find
any pleasure left in words.
They have become like those sharp
fragments of shell and coral
when you walk barefoot across the sand.
I feel as if I want to throw aside this pen
take up a brush and
with single stroke write
This is the place I'm in
This is me
And there you are
Who ever you might be
The kingfisher screeches and flies off
This is no Cold Mountain
More like the Fourth Beach in Anwar's poem.
Some place I've walked into
And I have no brush and ink.
Just this broken pencil
and this book.
And time to laze and think
and look and scribble down some lines.
Like I used to.
Out there by the boat with blue awning
little fish jump clear of the water in a
flash of white spray
as they try to flee
from something just below
the surface of the sea.