THE PERSISTENT LEVITATOR
There are too many words
like in a Russian novel
& easy to lose
the first ecstatic jolt
I trace with my finger
the fireline of the volcano
I am undermined by your sweetness
*
The women are rising up
& down the coast from Kaikoura
spinning
like turnips
out over the sea
The sun glints
off the steel caps of their boots
They are happy
*
Needing a word
for the little jumps
on the surface of things
(that certain
blurring of the edges
like the sea’s turning-back
or the gulls hitched up on elastic)
I’m still hanging around
My sleeves ripple like flags
from The Persistent Levitator, Wellington: Victoria UP, 1994
© Bernadette Hall
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