Not the I Ching

At first you drew

the lines in sand

I jumped across

then back again

You laughed

‘It’s play’ you said

More lines than years

In sand – then stone

I jumped and then

one broke

Through words unsaid

More time than lines

As stone to dust

And like the last

apart

On Arriving at Stewart Island

A fine mist swirled.

Out in the inlet the water had turned

from a maelstrom,

to a gently undulating snake.

As if to forget the last thirty hours.

The sun poked through thick cloud,

which still scuttled across the sky,

as a frightened fish might

if suddenly disturbed, by a heavy handed
fisherman.

The air stunk of electricity, and-renewal.

I will try to see you as a painting

The colors, you were always so colorless to me

Though, if I were pressed, I should have to say white,

But gray springs more to mind.

The scale, you were large, bigger as you got older, then the largeness faded as you neared death.

The subject, a still life- now thats a perfect image.

The stance, well! Walking away or running backwards

The gaze backward over your shoulder

You always watched your back

From years of experience, I suppose

The background is always shadows from your past

That still seemed to haunt you seventy years on

The foreground seemed to be a haze for you but a clear patch of white light that could not be crossed to me

The effect – a father lost to his son

May 2000