Hone Tuwhare/Melrose Road
I can’t find the painting I did of Hone
Tuwhare at Janet Paul’s, looking at Mary
bringing us a tray of English Breakfast
teas
Writing —
Stiff-kneed Mary Came, and YES She Said
Merely
Maryly
Tea Mother
But in the bottom right hand corner of
this painting you can see the blazing
big yellow hill, behind the Alexandra
yard shunter, on my way out from the
camping ground. They’ve just bulldozed
the living, changing, challenging orchard
heart up front out. For a laundromat...
Can you hear Hone read — Exulting men
skilled as spiders’ thread
a skyline of steel crucifixes?
Who put the oak seat in this severe ’60s
shed? The one touch of indulgent pleasure
I miss when I buy my place. Cairnmuirs
behind me. Reflected.
1975 acrylic on paper 640 x 930 mm