– 148 –

What to Do While Waiting in Casualty

listen to the sound of the long
bones knitting their gristle

trace the thread with the ease of a needle
slicing through skin in intimate embroidery

see the signs of ecstasy, fantasy, LSD
and coke which isn't cola, all discernible as coma

think how many drinks that drunk drank as a thin
tincture of blood slips through his indifferent fingers

watch the frisky red cells luge down
the tubing hurrying in vein

spend thirty-six cramped immovable hours
pondering on why it's called a stretcher

exhale exhaustion, wish for trivia,
and reflect on the spectrum of pain

– 149 –

Hand-Made House

This house holds the essence of a climbing hut. Listen
carefully. Do you hear the echoed tread of men who
walked the hills when mountain hardware was
leather, metal and hickory? When no woman could
own a building such as this, explore the safest plain
or hold the straight grained haft of an ice axe. She

might hold a magnesium flared smile as she
sent the climbing party on its way or she could
spend her over-heated days crafting plain
scones to belay the bellies of men who
sought Aspiring. No one would listen
to her wish to join them unless she was

the owner of a stout skirt and was
a foreigner like Freda du Faur. She
who climbed Mt Cook in a virtual crinoline, and could
rappel in an elegant wrap. Listen.
From up here the noise the waves make is plain
as the plangent thud of avalanche. Who

heard it coming and danced on its lip and who
was inert and overcome, drowned in snow? Was
the mountain silent in her triumph or could
she hold the urge to hurl more granite? She
now sits scratching her spine with cirrus. Listen
to the wind scourging the beeches. The plain

– 150 –

wavers. Come inside. This loft is warm and plain-
song saturates the bunkroom. This house was
influenced by all those huts which she
had inhabited. Now the boys listen
from their sleeping bags and argue about who
will flick the light out. The builder could

only shake his head and hammer harder. He could
not easily digress from building a plain
city bungalow nor allow a sleeping loft which was
suspended over beds in the kitchen, but she
was fiercely insistent. Now it is he who
brings his mates around and asks them to listen

to the acoustics and appreciate the cedar. She
sleeps content in the loft where she can listen
for echoed tread moving to the hills from the plain.

– 151 –

Plot 608, The Old Balclutha Cemetery

how deep grief is

how insubstantial this sand
to hold these
the fleshless remnants
of our parents

all our ancestral DNA

exons to earth
introns to dust

who will read you now
my brave wee mother

and who decode
your silence, Dad

and what will we,
the messengers
say to the world