full stop
‘..these are a few
of my favourite things’
sydney, january 2000
when everything stops,
you find yourself walking,
the sound of your shoes like
rope straining on wood,
the evening hasn’t come down,
unlikely colour lasting,
curious hope against the
silvered weight of stars,
stars atip a darkness.
everything stops, your
feet breathing a rhythm
through the grip of your
shoes, heel landing
true on the pavement.
each footfall
a wind flips up
a corner of the night.
a flurry of tree, washing.
something struck along
the fence, emptily sounding
craving meaning,
stops, you don’t, can’t
put down this single evening,
any evening a single evening
in the tie untie of wind where
you find a movement, a plastic
bag, leaves dragged out of
light into the tip of shadow
across, leaves flung out of
season, touches ahead
more sure than yourself,
how everything stops
in a season of desert, your
heart shacked up in shadow.
keep to yourself your favourite
things, heart, blade, lip of
water, lip of stone, a moon
going down with dry rot,
keep to yourself,
you are stopped in sleep
that draws your bone,
your flesh out in a
breaking sea of blue,
a dream under the eye.
Copyright ©2023 Peter Le Baige. All Rights Reserved
Click on the link above to hear a reading of the poem. The accompanying music is from ‘The Dorian Horizon for 17 Strings’ by Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu & performed here by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra under Seiji Ozawa in a 1969 release.
Ruru ki Te Ruru 