Ginny’s Garden

(for Ginny Sullivan, 1950-2017)

 

Magpies quardle-oodle in the high firs.

Down here, under the overhang, it’s hot,

 

looking out over the lawn Karen says she cut

two weeks ago, and already thick, clumpy,

 

to the paddock where Friendly, the seven-year-old ewe

that you couldn’t bear to send to the butcher,

 

baas by the fence for kale and attention.

The veggies you planted have gone mad:

 

tomatoes big as butternuts; huge, shiny aubergines;

giant marrows; cabbage whites all over the basil.

 

In the Pears’ Soap poster in the bathroom,

two small girls still stare at large bubbles.

 

 

Harry Ricketts

 

 

Harry Ricketts teaches English literature and creative writing at Victoria University of Wellington. His latest collection, Winter Eyes, has been longlisted for this year’s Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.