Hydrangeas.

The New World.

Out in the Old West beyond

Before the gangstas, but now.

Paddocks of rye and clover

Tidily fenced with six wires and

One barbed.

Willow in the lows and big night macoracarpa

Along the boundaries.

Pitiless sun.

Through a sharp gap in the dull trees

Two paddocks

One greener than the other

A big black bull stands in his own shadow

The white tip of his tail flicking.

Three Of A Kind.

Wednesday the Seventh.

A poem with a typo

That makes virtue of cliche

Hung in a small close room

With disinterested visitors

Hidden by their own perfume


Tui hits a bum note

Drunk on cherry blossom

In the park where kids on wheels

Learn of physics and pain


An old house with rotten boards

Electric saw cut teeth

Lets in new wood

Soakers, Metalex and bog

And a lick of paint.

No Title.

Spring.

The gorse is fresh and soft

Cadmium coconut petals

Not yet dry splinters

That poison the skin

And burn like a witch.

No Title.

Seal Ends.

Seal ends

Metal begins

Short change

Clatter in the wheel arch


Metal ends

Track begins

Bog down

Get out and walk


Track ends

End begins

Sharp reef

On bare feet


End starts

Tide turns

Step off

the end

The Cruel Sea.

Horizon.

The horizon is keen and bright

Where it meets forbidding land

Darkening under the shadow of sea cloud

To reverse the agreement


Silver sea and dark land

Shining cloud and lead sea.


The sharply ruled line borders

The yeasty churn of the cycles

The pull of the moon

The draw of the tide


If priest at the marriage of Moon and tide

Then midwife and pall bearer

Between Sun and light.


And a God

All encompassing

But for you alone.

8-02

17-01

Snap.

Point to point

Across the bay

A wet in wet

Wash of cloud

Grey grim over

Stone green sea

The pot o gold

Over by the wharf

Another End.

The Bowler.

Island of fat trees in the park

Branches hanging low to make a fortress

For kids and others


The trees half in half out

Scratching at the red tin shelter

For the old bowlers


Pin stripes of pee green lawn

Framed by a chalky rectangle

And a fence that would only keep an old man in

Starched and tipsy


Crumpled forms in the fortress

A dark nest for the destitute

Of cardboard and weed and drink


Warm daylit oblivion huddle

Next to the gentle clack of the jack

Until the game is over and

Hard night comes with cold lungs

And nocturnal stir and trudge till

Dawn and another end.

On A Clear Day.

Spring Light.

Shades.

Along with the bright spring sunshine

Are the cold deep shadows cast

by headlands and obstructions

To the long low light.


Not shade for the reef birds

inspecting the shore break but

a place to avoid or endure.


Not the cool refuge from summer heat

But the dwelling place for

the opposite of the expanding joy

Of the new sun after a long winter


The long season captures the shadows

With its sharp fingers

And hoards the gloom


Only relaxing its grip when the night comes

To rob the day of light

Like the tide seeping up the estuary

Mixing waters, salt with fresh to brack.


A barnacled cliff rock drips tears of delight

Into a sky pool clouded by dusk

and bright ripples enchant

as the sky darkens.

Shades.

Huia.

Reader

Leaving space to read

In between the lines and entering

that place that needs filling


Sharply focussed or in the peripheral

Clarity in the optic or

Fun house mirror


My reflection in the pool

Your shadow on the page

Pitching your doubt into my

Shifting conceit


The words entombed in a tightly closed book

Never read

But hugging their meaning close

In the terrifying darkness

Leaves.

Cast concrete stairs climb up in the empty forest

Rainbowed glass and corrugated iron rotting

Webbed with the delicate skeletons of dropped leaves


Sentried by skewed posts with no wire

Dry water pipes and lives out of time


Pa with empty pits

Slipped terraces

Unmanned lookout


Once seen lovers in the gentle currents

Youth and age gone, their descendants

return with the new season.

Excursion

Cormorant on a branch

Slow and fat

Drying its wings

A black neon cross

Needing constant adjustment

But always tilting


Urban images repeat over

Capitalism sin and debauchery

The refinement of social strata

Old money


Saturday the 28th

12.42.          

Left luggage

Cross country


Wet loam diesel and resin

Guard dogs

Between stations

Fluorescent nature


The need of room for

Memory
                                   
Catharsis and
                                   
Mysticism


The secrets of the water

A Firm Grip

It's a big day for some

But not here

A breeze and birdsong

A little more gravity than

Yesterday

But that is to be expected


It's the worst day for some

But not here

Exhaust

Light headed and trip footed

Laughing gas


Another day another dialectic

Synthetic equilibrium

To be confused with the real thing

Half full when filling

Half empty when drunk

Soberly


.

Kasimir Malevich. Black Square 1915. Oil on linen.

Blue Moon.

Thirteenth moon circadian

Dead low dead calm

Clear light on the water


Insisting that the people turn

On the shadowing land and

Look to the cheesy radiance

For original nature.

A Little Grey Bird.

I will press on

It's late and the tide is dropping

Leaving smooth wet sand

Bruised purple by the sky


Up from the flats tracking the creek

Pool to pool

Basalt islands in rapids

Water giggling excitedly

On its trip to the beach


Embracing trees cry like birds

As the valley walls rise hard

Volcanics  tectonics  hydraulics

The water below hissing


A little grey bird calls and flutters

In the vast space of the valley

Small hope note dancing

Above rapid and fall


There at the head of the valley

And the foot of the falls

Twilight mixes with the mist

Fluttering birds and shivering ferns.

Unnecessary Recollection.

The old scullery sink, concrete trough with divider

Steel rim and lead pipes.

Mismatched taps bright chrome and dull brass

Sturdy timber structure on wide floorboards.


Lifted once for some plumb adventure

Domestic archeology, desiccated shoe and cat bone

Dry soil and chutney glass elsewhere.


Here a job lot of the same scullery sinks inverted

Along with a serried row of yellow bricks

A futile but homely breakwater playing

Peek a boo with the shiftless sands


A wry weekend battlement built by

An earnest Kiwi Cnut defining

The extent of the Kingdom

The Bailey the Papakianga.



The palace raised and the king in exile

The bush has returned with weeds rampant

And the remnant of a tended garden

Bright blooms of the season garland

Rusting tin and crushed gutter

Unnecessary Protection.

It is nearly spring, a new year, and

There is new growth on the old trees that

Line the derelict parade.


A warm winter sun drops below

Gull grey storm clouds, casting

Painters light and promises.


A jumble of red brick and shell shot cement

Clutter the sand.

Slain lamp posts and wormed jarrah lie.

A sea defence against a tide

That will never now wrong.


The vulnerable have already succumbed

To their forgotten fates leaving

A midden, an unnecessary protection

For dwellings long abandoned and for

Care free seabirds

Impressions.

Footprints in the sand

Duck feet in the mud

Flick of the trowel in once wet cement


Wind on water

Scar on my eye

Salt tear on your tongue.

Soundings

Walking on hard wet sand

By the gentlest tide

Still and quiet except


For some guy hitting an oil drum with a spanner

The he haw saw of the mynah birds

The furnace roar of the flight path

The slap of the cormorants wing on water

The shrill soundings of children

The doppler chop of a helicopter.



The harbour the sound of an elegant lady bathing



The hollow hammer of the engine in the belly of a fishing boat

The cries of success and failure from the fishermen on the wharf


Silent splash of a plunging seabird

The proud silence of the Totora trees.

Bar and Mote.

Breeze steady, cool air,

Crisp light, association free.

Memory from 40 light years ago

Not nostalgia but

With a dread of light with no meaning.



The Sun darts behind a cloud

Like a hand over a lamp.

But it soon returns

As fearful and revealing as before.



Four decades ago,

The light was unexamined

Angles of refraction and

Angels of reflection

Bar and mote

Mist glow

All joyful oblivion.

Post Storm Huiku.

Water flows through reeds

Golden cloud crowns dark hills

Hills lie in washes.



Sound of small steady stream

Sea fret smudges the island

Bird cries on the reef



Water drips down

Saturated swamp streams

Dead octopus points.

Lake On A Still Sunny Day.

Rain Huiku.

White shells on black sand

Bowing branches drip water

Water filled foot print.

Cold rain falls on sand

Seal the shape of stone

Puddles ice the reef.

Grey green sea cloudscape

Wharf fades into pale mist

Heron rows the air.

Tarawera 1

Tarawera.

Landlocked lake with short fetch

Sorts out a sharp slap of

Fresh water on foamy stone.


The cold wind cuts through crisp light

From the amputated peaks of the mountain.


Peace now like peace before but not then.


From when the fundamentals weren't

When drowned ships sailed

And night sky was fire bright

And the silent earth wasn't

And stones rained down.


The science of it explains the mechanism

But strange Gods to test faith so harshly

The why of stone turned to liquid,

Of air turned to fire,

And all beauty turned to ash.

Pacific Colours.

Cerulean between the dark clouds

Wash ultramarine on the water.


To the North a squall blurs

To the right a beautiful broken rainbow falls

Onto a grey monument on an overgrown headland.


Squall curdles to storm

Flash and roll

The horizon closes

And our heads are bowed down by a hard rain.


Why did we come out here?

Shouldn't we have listened to the forecast?


It's because we wanted to see the beautiful colours in the sky.

NB.

Conjunction.

Fog has trapped warm air under its weight.

On still water at full tide

Lying in horizonless tranquility.


Pale lit mist smudging geometries and bewildering.

Reflecting reflection echoing silence

A discreet veil for Aurora, spotlight moon

And Venus coupling with Jupiter.

NB 17.

Two Gates One Journey. (for Jacqui Miles)

 I.    Two gates, one journey.


II.    33 tanalised pine posts in a line.


III.   33 spindly lancewood trees down to the boardwalk.


V.    A stand of kauri.


VI.   Pine Ave   1/2 hr


VII.  Seven wooden steps in the clay.


VIII.  One more thing.


IX.    A slippery wooden bridge nine paces long.


X.    Two barking dogs.


XI.   Three cabbage trees.


XII.   One fern bird calling.


XIII.  Thirteen oystercatchers crying.


XIV.  Seven buoys silent.

NB 9.

And The Wind

I have been here before but

The light is different.

And the wind is blowing

Making the water dirty so

I will go inland.


Reverie; bitter thoughts of some

Perceived wrongdoing

From another century.

In another country.

And I wake to dull forest


Trees with selfish winter blooms

Private flowers for self pollination.

No sun, no dapple.

Smell of wet, smell of clay.


I meet three dogs on the flats

They are wary and bark

And bark.

Until I go.

Laughing Gas. (Chasing The Aurora)

Nostalgia


Used to be an illness with medicine and stern words of warning

Then it had it's heyday, middle aged and weepy but rehabilitated

If not fashionable.

Then sadly it became outdated, yesterday's emotion.

How I ache for those days.



Sentimentality


Another mental sprain glazing the user in a vitrine of longing,

Fixing free floating feelings on obsolete objects.

Antique artefacts rubbed longingly, suspiciously.

Yesterday's fad redundant, becomes today's reliquary

Tomorrow's curio.



Twin aches, like arthritis and lumbago

The sadistic Gods of old age.

Or Hypnos and Thanatos the dark Gods of

Sleep and death, to a citizen of Troy.



Where the heroic thinkers only sentiment was

In dreaming of a future nostalgia.

Tide Fall.

The Southerly has made fresco of the sky,

Pale horizon to lapis above, in one smooth sweep.

Frigid beauty like a marble Venus.


Below, wind against tide.

Angry waves struggling out of the harbour

Like chastened sinners leaving the cold chapel.

NB 6.

Solstice.

The clustering Matariki fades, as twilight dawns,

On the beginning of the shortest day.


The night dies and a black tailed fantail dances

in the indigo, indistinct.


Warning of the end of the

relentless, gradual, loss

Of light.


We wash in the salt water of sun rise.

Cold and fiery tears to rinse our bodies

Of darkness.


A regular renaissance.

NB 9.

The Bushmans Legacy.

This neck of the woods at least sounds right

With the nectar eaters chiming up top

But between factory and suburb

With the thin ribbon of trees, meagre, on the dirty stream banks.


The virtual reality of nature managed and cribbed

Dog shit gravel and moss slick board walks

Fluorescent rat runs and graffiti sprayed trunks.

Ready to drink, drunk and chucked.


Magnificence of old kahikatea and tanekaha

Shrouded in a mist of methy ethyl

And spent diesel stink.


Reconcile to the other side of the creek

Over a sturdy council bridge to the factory side.

Caged graffiti on mildewed shade cloth trapped

Behind cyclone mesh taut between water pipe uprights

Caged units.


Under barbed wire,

Stacks of pallets

Skips full of flat brown cardboard

Polystyrene strata

Cheap cars parked by the gross.


Graffiti up high, graffiti on the cracked pavement

Graffiti neatly sanded away

Graffiti painted grey

Graffiti over and over


Much as the bushmen came and made their mark

With the axe, the crosscut and the fire.

Planks stacked and the clay turned for

Cold houses and sour wine.











 

NB 8. (For Liz)

Memory of a far place.

If I hadn't been to the other side and seen for myself

I wouldn't have understood the conflation of volcanoes where

Distance pulls to flatten and attenuate, to sphagnum green

and paints beautiful muscular form.


From this place of future memory I see 

Cumulus in perspective

above the approaches.

One vent surrounded by a crop of stone

Another turned to quarry.


It's in the flat mountains between, where

Curious disciplines collude and conspire,

A thousand years after the fact,

To speculate on long dead lovers.

NB 7.

Convention.

Breakfast.

Purity.

Transgression.

Morning tea.

Disgrace.

Renunciation.

Lunch.

Relapse.

Epiphany.

Afternoon tea.

Transformation.

Apotheosis.

Drinks.

Egg First.

Hot and tired and hungry at the lake

Drop our packs down strip off and swim in

Cool clean water.


Air dry on the grass and restore some modesty

Unpack plastic click clack

Dates and nuts an apple and a boiled egg.


Egg first, cracked on the knee

Peeled in tiny fragments but then a satisfying release

Shiny firm albumen revealed


A twist of salt in grease proof paper

White on white

First bite of salty sulphur.


Then a feast of picnic while the billy boils

Someone has cake.

We should make it home.

NB 6.

Serengeti.

Safety In The Outdoors.

You need to watch out for trouble.


The bush here is safe, in its way.

There are no snakes, hidden, or tigers,

No poison darts or Kalashnikovs.


Unlike the Serengeti where we once saw a giant eagle

Swoop on a hyrax, only to lose its grip

And drop it's prey.

Never to hit the ground as

It was seized, in the air, by the jaws of a passing hyena.

The winner on the day.


But you can get bluffed and fall,

Or get caught out by a raging creek,

Or get mistaken for a buck, or a duck,

And get shot.

Or just become lost.


If you are still with us, you

Should follow a creek or is it a ridgeline?

You should stay with the boat or the aeroplane, you should

Use your watch as a compass or

Empty your pack to use as a hat to

Blindfold you to the reality

That you are lost.



You can place a small smooth river stone in your mouth

And press it against the roof of your mouth

With your tongue

But don't swallow it.

NB 5.

Repetition With.

sky the colour of an eye

  sea the colour of a broken promise

sand the colour of sand

  bird the colour of a dropped glove.


clouds of warm steam



  buoy the colour of happiness

boat the colour of gravy

  rocks the colour of a bad temper

reef the colour of broken teeth


  sea and be seen



  shells the colour of bone

wood the colour of a lost dog

  trees the colour of a wish

earth the colour of ash


  to have been.

NB 4.

Murder.

It's a townies idea of a wilderness

A gate and a track you can drive a truck down

Navigated engineered and dammed


Except in spring when the kowhai forest flowers

Chrome yellow under cobalt blue

And flocks of tui wheel and rattle

Drunk on nectar.


Quiet compared to Karanga a Hape road

Where big cars boom and rattle

And the flock are drunk on rum and party

Under cadmium light


One with a dam in his head, cutting the flow

Of love producing an issue, still borne.

A jigsaw puzzle


Solved by disposal, beyond the light

In the tangle of supple jack and bush lawyer

Watched by the owl.


Exposed by the dawn to no one

Turning sweet nature into forbidden land

Waiting for redemption.

NB3

NB2. (Harakeke, Ti, Manuka)

Field Notes.

The sky caught in the ruts of the reef

Black shag drying on a shipwrecked tree trunk

Prehistoric cry of herons.



Small wooden footbridge over creek

Carving in the clay

Pool to rill to pool to fall


Monument.

Sun lighting the forest like a spoon

Cutting the top off an egg



Mushroom flesh over wet green moss

Thin muscular lancewood with insect fingers

Low sun on a short day



The luxury of the plateau

Highlit textures and saturated colour

Sacred niche in the forest



The indifference of the far off traffic.

Note Book 1. (NB1.)

Bronze over stone.

The labour of Sisyphus once,

To roll the boulder to the start of the loop track

With bronze plaque fixed,

To commemorate the jubilee of five score.

Too long for one lifetime just,

Senile, incontinent and orphaned.



But sap young for history

A hundred years of stone and

Little changes but the sky.

Aotea, Kamo.

Ruru. (Little Owl)

Bright white room with a view

Not of the Duomo

But of the bush, kanuka and the rest.


High and dry and filled with enlightenment,


Looking to the dark corridors of the forest.

That shelters the little knowing owl

Who calls her name over until exasperated

Tears the night with a cry for understanding.

Summer Counting II.

From The Coast.

Away from the coastal, up the track by the waterfall

Sand turns to clay and fern and soon turns to tea tree.

And wilding pine, sent to civilise.

A welcoming fantail tells its story of death, ignored.


At the corner, the orange clay veined with red,

The slick steps blurred by the rain

Best to turn to avoid the treachery of the land.

Run to the crest of the ridge, cut across by the metalled road

And drop down again from the plateau to the treasure.


Where rooty track abruptly becomes grip tread board walk,

Running low over sluggish water.

Geometric fern and whip reed moire

Build architecture for shy birds.


Along and down through the doughnut car park,

Past the graffiti trees and the changing huts

To the picnic tables in the shadows.

0612.

Solstice.

The last time I was here I stumbled through the sweating bush,

Down to the track behind the huts.

All luminous blue green radiance, with the sea inviting.

I met the others in the scarlet shade of a flowering tree

Where I dog dropped and lay listening to the splash of the seas

And the beat of my heart.



That summer is over and the rough stumble has turned

To a tight stroll along the flat parade.

The trees, bee and bird free, shake in the cold South wind,

The wind that scuds a stony cloud that is too mean to rain.

Low against corrugated water, surly from neglect.



Small fire of twigs and seaweed lit before dawn

To warm the bones after the longest night,

And an offering of food on a toy raft

To appease the sea gods.

0207.

Big Muddy.

The birds in the big old pohutakawa give company in the quiet.

The quiet of the lowest tide, framed by a thin bank of bone white shells

Pushed and raked by currents gone, revealing the cold grey mud.


Kingfisher halcyon, queen cormorant, tui bishop, oystercatcher and gull.

Going about their arcane games with note and cry.


Steady crop smoke from the far shore of the harbour signals the seasons end,

Mudstone strata of ochre and burnt orange show a different degree of timekeeping,

Settled and layered and born up from the soft reef,

To rudely display the muddy calendar of tides past.


Norfolk tree and rubble reef around the boat ramp,

Engine block moorings and rope wrapped tyres for the old buoys,

Clear yellow sunlight dropped in the barbecue cage.

0507.

Little Muddy.

In the furthest corner of what I can see

There is a post, perpendicular to the

Grey green smoke blue horizon.

A lone pile set in mud to guide the sailor

To the safe chanel.

The deep trench in the stingray shallows

Filled with beasts and fear and salvation.

Don't capsize.

0914.

Hokku. Basho. 1689. (alternative translation)

the rough sea—
flowing toward Sado Isle
the River of Heaven

0412.

Hokku. Basho. 1689.

araumi ya / Sado ni yokotau / amanogawa

the rough sea / stretching out towards Sado / the Milky Way 

0207.

Toast.

Day	Toast
Sunday	"Absent Friends"
Monday	"Our Ships at Sea"
Tuesday	"Our Men"
Wednesday	"Ourselves" (as no one else is likely to be concerned for us!)
Thursday	"A Bloody War or a Sickly Season" (and a quick promotion!)
Friday	"A Willing Foe and Sea-Room"
Saturday	"Wives and Sweethearts" (may they never meet)

0207. (T)

Song To The Siren. Tim Buckley.

Long afloat on shipless oceans
I did all my best to smile
'Til your singing eyes and fingers
Drew me loving to your isle
And you sang
Sail to me
Sail to me
Let me enfold you
Here I am
Here I am
Waiting to hold you

Did I dream you dreamed about me?
Were you here when I was forecastle?
Now my foolish boat is leaning
Broken lovelorn on your rocks,
For you sing, "Touch me not, touch me not, come back tomorrow:
O my heart, O my heart shies from the sorrow"

I am puzzled as the newborn child
I am riddled as the tide.
Should I stand amid the breakers?
Should I lie with Death my bride?
Hear me sing, "Swim to me, Swim to me, Let me enfold you:
Here I am, Here I am, Waiting to hold you"

0611.

Deep Sea.

The  deep sea or deep layer is the lowest layer in the ocean, existing below the thermocline and above the seabed, at a depth of 1000 fathoms (1800 m) or more. Little or no light penetrates this part of the ocean and most of the organisms that live there rely for subsistence on falling organic matter produced in the photic zone. For this reason scientists once assumed that life would be sparse in the deep ocean but virtually every probe has revealed that, on the contrary, life is abundant in the deep ocean.

Anapala.

Freight.

The scarlet balloon waved from the sedge grass that grows in the margin between land and sea. The balloon was no longer firm and fully inflated and was weighed down by its tail of message tags and string. The messages were of bereavement, "I will miss you mate" said one, another "you will live on through your children". Sad notes from a far away funeral.

I cut the pale string with a sharp sea shell and released the balloon to the wind. It rose quickly and was soon absorbed into the blue, pacific sky.

0412.

Wednesday 22 April 2015.

High	12:15AM	3.4m
Low	6:32AM	0.4m
High	12:34PM	3.3m
Low	6:51PM	0.4m

First Light	6:25AM
Sunrise	6:52AM
Sunset	5:48PM
Last Light	6:15PM

0607.

Beaufort Wind Scale

Beaufort wind force scale

The Beaufort scale, which is used in Met Office marine forecasts, is an empirical measure for describing wind intensity based on observed sea conditions.

Specifications and equivalent speeds

Beaufort wind scale	Mean Wind Speed		Limits of wind speed		Wind descriptive terms	Probable wave height in metres*	Probable maximum wave height in metres*	Seastate	Sea descriptive terms
	Knots	ms-1	Knots	ms-1
0	0	0	<1	<1	Calm	-	-	0	Calm (glassy)
1	2	1	1-3	1-2	Light air	0.1	0.1	1	Calm (rippled)
2	5	3	4-6	2-3	Light breeze	0.2	0.3	2	Smooth (wavelets)
3	9	5	7-10	4-5	Gentle breeze	0.6	1.0	3	Slight
4	13	7	11-16	6-8	Moderate breeze	1.0	1.5	3-4	Slight - Moderate
5	19	10	17-21	9-11	Fresh breeze	2.0	2.5	4	Moderate
6	24	12	22-27	11-14	Strong breeze	3.0	4.0	5	Rough
7	30	15	28-33	14-17	Near gale	4.0	5.5	5-6	Rough-Very rough
8	37	19	34-40	17-21	Gale	5.5	7.5	6-7	Very rough - High
9	44	23	41-47	21-24	Strong gale*	7.0	10.0	7	High
10	52	27	48-55	25-28	Storm	9.0	12.5	8	Very High
11	60	31	56-63	29-32	Violent storm	11.5	16.0	8	Very High
12	-		64+	33+	Hurricane	14+	-	9	Phenomenal

*

1. These values refer to well-developed wind waves of the open sea.
2. The lag effect between the wind getting up and the sea increasing should be borne in mind.

   

 
 

•