Title: Sport 40: 2012

Publication details: Fergus Barrowman, 2014, Wellington

Part of: Sport

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Sport 40: 2012

Ruth Upperton

page 332

Ruth Upperton

Department of Immigration

The second home is always in the shadow of the first.
We are far from music. We listen to the birds.
We are far from chocolate. We fast.
We are far from the sea. We dig lakes in the back paddock.

Father says, Imagine you are in a forest.
You have an axe. You have a knife.
What are you going to do now?

There was once a dance in a vege garden,
a boat as a present, a smooth upshoot of bubbles in a glass.
There was a way of saying that was like giving.
We do not talk this way now.

Mother says, Imagine you are naked.
You have one shadow between you.
What are you going to do now?

We are not committing to this horizon.
The ocean will sedately swallow us.
You can’t expect us to make for that horizon.
We are just weathering a tempest here.

Father says, Imagine you are solid.
A stranger’s hand is on your shoulder.
Imagine you are waiting.
What are you going to do now?

page 333

Dutch instruction

Optimism is the idea that it not always will rain.
Leave home as soon as you are free,
for everyone comes back again—

just never board a train
without a member of family.
Optimism is the idea that it not always will rain,

that between sea and plain
will forever sprout a city.
For everyone comes back again.

Do not treat land reclaimed
as you would the earth itself. Usually,
optimism is the idea that it not always will rain,

but sometimes it is a plane
in a white sky.
For everyone comes back again,

they return aboard their vessels of love. That is in translation
(from the Maori, a song). See,
optimism is the idea that it not always will rain
for everyone. Come back again.

page 334

The prosecution

he loosed the boat that sank the ship
he muttered swears and gave us lip

he took sweet cherries from the girls
he swallowed whole the summer pearls

he took white sailboats from the boys
he gave the dead a waking voice

he shook the baby in the cot
he left the cabbages to rot

he spat into the casserole
he left the dreamer in the hole

he smashed the glass-spun hummingbird
he wouldn’t use the magic word

he took our tongues and gave us lies
he made the graveman improvise

he slapped the spinster in the face
he broke the boy who won the race

he disembowelled the sacred cow
he said to us, start running now

he dyed the wedding dresses red
he filled the old man’s head with lead

and this is why we want him dead
and this is why we want him dead