Odling IV: More reflections

It is absolutely fascinating to sit silently in a room while a group of people discuss your poetry and what it means to them. I felt like a ghost. It is very instructive and useful, too.

However, it is galling to realise that a group of perceptive people who have had a whole week to mull your poem over have, every single one, missed The Point (though one came close).

Obviously, the poem that follows needs some work.

I'll be posting updates as they happen but here is the original, as it met the workshop. You can do me a favour if you wish to, dear readers, by posting comments on what you think it is about, and any other thoughts on it that you might have.

Colours II

So. There I was
Walking along on the green green grass
(which was rather moist. Clear water and brown mud
squished around my no-longer-freshly-polished boots,
dappling on the shiny black. Traffic
thrmmmed, vrmmmed, thrshhmmed. There
was a definite odour of cow … …ness.)
And I thought:
The sky is blue.

Then I thought,
The sky is not blue.
Above me, the sky is lapis lazuli
(traded from Egypt, back in the day, to European monasteries,
crushed to make the mantle of Our Heavenly Queen, delicately
stitched with the gold it’s worth its weight in and,
after all that,
hidden away in a book.)

At one edge of the sky’s upended bowl
(a very big one)
Is clear crystal,
Several shades of turquoise sandwiched in between,
With a few streaks of white
(which could be the cataracts in an old woman’s eye)
like the greenstone drop I gave my grandmother
(of pounamu, jade, the king stone, of kahurangi that
is also the sky, my dear, and precious)
And a brightness somewhere up there
Seen in eyes’ corners or eyes’ shutting.

So there I was (still
walking, by reason of my bicycle
being broken – which is a long story)
Contemplating my bowl of jewels:
My turquoise, crystal, lapis, my kahurangi – all that,
And my pretty little sky shattered.

I was trudging through the green grass,
(and the essence of cow)
Crunching broken bits under foot (half
wishing I could pick them up because I
am poor) and I
Didn’t
Dare
Look up because what if I’d busted it
(irreparably) and
If the sky isn’t colours what is it?
What’s left?
When I raise my eyes, what will be seen?

And I hid under my cap (brown leather,
second-hand for two dollars) and just
Walked (one foot, then another) until I reached a
Construction
(roof, walls, garden, warmth, people)
Home,
Where I found, after all, that I had
(plus a gift from a cow)
This (but I’ll
leave the details to your imagination)
The sky is still blue
Sky is.

Don't think of this as a bodged poem. Think of it as the start of an interesting journey.

That's all.