blue

your blue wooden house
still nestles in Niaqornat
                        Johanna

the washing line once
a bunting of towels and nappies
                        stands empty
the breathy songs of narwhals
dried by the wind

that last night in the front room
Johanna four tall candles
                        held stillness
around you an orchestra
of faith in light

and when morning arrived
with the sledge you were blessed
                        with herbs and moss
the whole village behind you
all the way to Chapel

do you remember saying
the ice would never change?
                        these days
it’s too thick for boats
too thin for sledges

some hunters shoot their dogs
unmended nets sleep on the beach
                        what happened
to elbow grease Johanna?
everyone’s on the internet

Kerrin P  Sharpe 
from Hoof, Te Herenga Waka Press, XXXX

This is one of my favourite Kerrin Sharpe poems. At first glance the elegy honours and laments an old woman Johanna, while also reflecting on the changes climate crisis has brought to her remote village in Greenland. Then the title, ‘blue’ with its associations of feeling down or depressed reflects on the high incidence of mental health related to the abandonment of cultural practices in the region. In the dark days of winter, instead of coming together in the evenings, ‘ Everyone’s on the internet.’ ‘ So many stay indoors/ forgetting/who they are.’

The traditional farewell to Johanna is conveyed in ten lines with a close up view … ‘four still candles held stillness /around you/ to the wide angle view of Johanna on the sled ‘ the whole village behind you/all the way to the Chapel.’ As with all Kerrin’s poems there is an astonishing agility and lightness of touch to the imagery.  The apt use of synesthetic lines,  ‘the breathy songs of narwhals/ dried by the wind.’ is another characteristic of her work that I admire. 

There is a power in the unanswered questions posed throughout but also a sense that the poet herself is baffled by the enormity of the environmental degradation.

‘Waves nibble away the cliffs.
What if the ice left
and never returned,
what then, Johanna?’

The shape of the stanzas, with their indented lines denote a kind of falling and for me, this juxtaposition of falling and grace or terror and beauty epitomize our extraordinary rich and fragile world.

Frankie McMillan

Frankie McMillan is an award winning poet and writer of short fiction. In 2019 her book, The Father of Octopus Wrestling, and other small stories(Canterbury University Press) was shortlisted for the NZSA Heritage Award and listed by Spinoff as one of the ten best fiction books of 2019. Her poetry has been selected for Ōrongohu  /Best New Zealand Poems 2012, 2015 and 2022, Landfall, Takahe and in international journals including Cincinnati Review, Shenandoah and Atlanta Review.   Her collection, Eddie Sparkle’s Bridal Taxi (CUP) was launched, October, 2025.

Kerrin P. Sharpe is the author of five poetry collections, most recently Hoof (2023) and Louder (2018). Her poems have appeared in local and international literary journals including Landfall, Turbine | Kapohau, Poetry Aotearoa Yearbook, POETRY (US), Blackbox Manifold, PN Review and Stand. Her work has been anthologised in Best New Zealand Poems six times, the anthology Best of Best New Zealand Poems, Oxford Poets 2013, 150 Essential New Zealand Poems and A Game of Two Halves: The Best of Sport 2005–2019. In 2021 she held a writing residency at the Michael King Writers Centre.