For Andrew (February 1961 - January 2000)
For your final scene:
an old barn near Pigeon Flat,
on an operatic hill slope.
The properties:
a dun station wagon,
a handwritten book of poems,
binder twine.
The window
reveals the chequered scene,
soft entanglements
since a ngaio let you down,
pills failed, the cliff
was too abrupt.
These roles you'd taken,
student, poet, confessor, father,
your last one: loser in love.
In the barn small creatures lie,
borer beetles in the timbers,
mice doze in their nests.
Here wild bees have made a hive -
on the cusp of a new age you sway
as they drone a lullaby.
I read the poem
in a scarlet covered book
about how your brother
tied the tomatoes up
with strips of my
'worn-out pantyhose'.
But pantyhose don't wear out -
they run run run.
Nor was there any brother -
I was the one who
raised the tender plants
sagging under
their own weight.
Through the intense summer
that you were away
the tomatoes swelled
into huge red hearts.
©Barbara Strang 2011