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Sport 20: Autumn 1998
a walk on the course
a walk on the course
and there were warm puddings and talk
soft rain last summer when i waited
in the loggia behind the house
while you died
the braided cypress
dimmed with dew
and when our friend arrived with you
who gave it to me
i made you sit on the deck to see the spot
in which i'd planted it
and wouldn't let you in the house
because you had to smoke
it was a cold morning
you didn't stay long
you won't be back
look up there the light
industrial
meets The Whau
in waiting rain
a bulk of dust
lain up against a clear sky
metal laced
over air
that seethes around them
the pylons go off in a huff
marching with argument
astride the turbid creek
my new runners
underneath
whetted
in limp grass
walking past bath towels snap
on the lines beside the jam full carpark
at the sauna where you went one night
in support of a bereft mate
and sat in the foyer reading the Herald
and said you thought of calling by our place
while he was inside getting over it
the way you do
in two shakes
would i get a Plunket donation box in there this year do you think?
‘We already have donation boxes’ says the owner
handing me a dollar
outside the school
my stick of a child chonks her cough
so i'll feed her the alcohol
free remedy she hates
oak leaves quicken in the road
along the course a white heron lofts
the toadstool i watch
here
red splotch gold
has pursed its lips
collapsed
and yet there were warm puddings and talk
soft rain last summer when i waited
in the loggia behind the house
while you died