#1643 - a boater bigger than the boy

 

1643

5.182

1.vii.24

a boater bigger than the boy

ekphrastic for Arthur Streeton’s ‘Morning Sketch – McMahon’s Point Ferry’

Hinton Collection, NERAM

 

 

a windswept green

red dress puffs up

 

no iron span or ferris wheel

 

all this blue and one above paler

 

stark light and geometry

one must imagine a sun

 

is home still far in the waves beyond?

 

we cannot remember what will come

 

though not the chimney season

there is wake of a vessel’s purpose

funnel’s worth of harbour

 

things present

things soon gone

 

ghosts of the future loom

 

the day as fresh as paint

for all that

there’s a flourish where we sign 

#1642 - last light at Dangar Falls

 

1642

5.181

30.vi.24

last light at Dangar Falls

 

raw cliffs

the all-tumble weight of it

a palette slip of the knife

 

witness this, vertiginous

 

dead limbs crossed

a languish

 

to fall

a long way down

 

and the sweet still clouds

 

stones lichen lit

 

as if the stream knew nothing

of what lies beyond the bend

 

and where the waters gather still

glaze of sun to tell

 

dry moss

and barkfalls

 

sung up!

for a trill track

rabbit on

 

bulloak to a breeze

barbed tops

and the grazing beside

 

cattle black stubble stillness

a yellow grey

and the green’s grey too

 

the strike thrush melds

in a foliage fold

 

I see the million years here

a million more  

 

past the last

the falls toil on

in a breath of fresh air

we leave

 

lasta lumo ĉe Dangar Akvofalo

krudaj klifoj

la tute-fala pezo de ĝi

paletroglito de la tranĉilo

por atesti ĉi tion, vertiĝa

mortaj membroj krucitaj

languigado

fali

longen malsupren

kaj la dolĉaj senmovaj nuboj

ŝtonoj likeno lumigita

kvazaŭ la rivereto scius nenion

pri kio estas preter la kurbo

kaj kie la akvoj ankoraŭ kolektiĝas

glazuro de suno rakonti

sekan muskon

kaj arbŝelfaloj

suprenkantante!

per trila trako

babiladas daŭre

bovkverko por venteto

barilpikitaj suproj

kaj la paŝtado apude

brutara nigra stopla kvieto

flava grizo

kaj ankaŭ la verda griza

la frapturdo kunfandiĝas

en foliara faldo

mi vidas la milionon da jaroj ĉi tie

kaj miliono pli

preter la lasta

la faloj laboregas

en enblovo de freŝa aero

ni foriras

#1642 - ajar

1642

5.181

30.vi.24

ajar

ekphrastic for Syd Long’s 1920 ‘The Green Gate’

Hinton Collection, NERAM

 

deep in the frame

 

the year lies bare

 

tribe of leaves trod in

 

the day

none saw

 

a ghost to swing these hinges 

#1640 - gilt memory

1640

5.179

28.vi.24

gilt memory

ekphrastic for Percy Spence’s 1912 ‘Tasman’s Fleet Doubling the Most Southerly Cape of Van Diemen’s Land’

 

 

at Earth’s end

in the roaring

 

a pomp of sails puffed

diadem stern

 

all furling

pennants taut

 

tugging after cloud 

after cliff

 

seadogs at rigging

 

to light their clay pipes

 

in the gull wake spray

in the heaving swell

 

onward and ho

         

no mention of smoke from the shore

or the giants

 

so British these Dutch

 

but it never happened

these weren’t the ships

 

there’s nowhere from which you could see this

 

it’s in the artist’s imagination

not one of these hats blows off

 

 

 

#1640 - fishing in dark waters

 

1640

5.179

28.vi.24

fishing in dark waters

ekphrastic for Karpathy Jenō (Eugen)’s 1939 ‘The Broad Danube’

Hinton Collection, NERAM

 

a mudwash of

two peer into time

 

are thick with such sky

won’t reflect

 

you cannot see the storm here

can’t see much in this mud

 

carp

or such speech

just guessing

 

think paprika

think kettle and fire

 

a curtain you can barely discern

 

river rolls still

drifts away

 

a stick stood up back of the boat

that’s fishing too

 

hardly a shadow cast to it

but tide shows tone

 

a prospect of atrocity

 

everyone had a piece of this

here’s the blood of so many tribes

 

not though here so godforsaken

 

too far from breakfast

too long till lunch

 

a pipe, a flask to share

palinka warms the tale

#1639 - Dorrigo

 

1639

5.178

27.vi.24

Dorrigo

 

clear winter

green and rolling

 

a storm thread split

the ancient folding of the land

 

dry on the top

 

the dieback dry

the glint tops shone

 

wires to sing it

 

angle white gums

a bare branch dance

 

leafless

boulder strew too

 

and the clouds and the cattle

and the fences come

 

the hay rolls into bales

 

sky close

in a whisper of stone