June
you have been named afteran English summer season
late at evening as I lay the cardsdown their clear ivory clatteris interrupted by the rustleof a cotton print dresspaisley hearts and spadesa splash of low cost color
there was the sharpnessof cutty grass on a hillsidewhere I crouched amongrusty cans and brown bottlestrying to make somekind of kingdom of all of it
it was a distinct cityyou had a distinct voicealready tough and a laughof corrugated cardboard
in one other metropolis I’d takecodeine and water into thedark room of your migraine
why do you retain comingslipping your self betweena black king and a pink queen?
my reminiscences actually are so fewand so explicit however you arrivewith a rustle and a nicotinevoice and the evening becomesvaricose with you dyingin the month of your namedeep in a southern midwinter
Taken with type permission from the not too long ago revealed assortment A Day Like No Different: Chosen poems by James Norcliffe (Otago College Press, $25). Christchurch author Erik Kennedy stated in his launch speech, “The poems are related, psychologically compelling, quietly and loudly political, involved with historical past and our place on the planet and within the cosmos. A Day Like No Different brings into focus simply how regularly he shoots for and hits the tough, high-value targets.”
