smithyman - trees

275
                                  TREES

                  not so many kauri
                                     rimu
and on the flats when
those were cut out
they put the fire in          kahikatea
                                     kohekohe
                                     taraire
                                     matai
                                     tawa

burning off

Black black black was the colour of my true love's hair.
Was after, grey, like ashes,
and were                       
                                       miro
                                      totara
                                      puketea

and those which had
bloodstain flowers,
the family of
                                        rata

Smithyman - Lone Kauri

225


LONE KAURI

Whatever happened, it happened.
In swamp, on lowlands, gum diggers find ancestors.
Sometimes a lot of them lying the one way
as though sometime was
a great wind which put down a bush if not a forest,
trunk by trunk, and they've been lying there unseen.
Their wood can still be good enough for working.
Hauled at, they are reluctant to be earth, turned over.
They are pigheaded.

On the climb to Ngapukehaua there's one
didn't go down, up there by himself standing
over teatree. He's not far from caves of the dead.
Maybe he feels responsible,
he's older. Nowadays

I have to stop for a breather.
He has been lightning smitten and gale struck.
He is failing from the top down.
I like to crouch into and lean my back against.
I say "Brother" and he sighs.

 
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