BRENT KININMONT

 

A Poem Lands at Christchurch

 
Eyes dart between paddocks, 
each a random memory, grazed 
 
until you turn from the vast tray 
of late summer’s colour samples 
 
to the red roof of a farmhouse, 
a combine reaping, 
 
and a shadow keeping up 
that you swear wasn’t there 
 
before it sprouted wings and a tail, 
a black bird swelling with 
 
the idea of its arrival, 
scanning rivers, hedges, fairways 
 
until it touches wheels touching down 
on the edge of the plains 
 
in the middle of remembering 
why it ushered you there. 

Listen to Brent Kininmont read ‘A Poem Lands at Christchurch

Figuring It Out

 
Hana and Hikari misread 
the ballet teacher’s 
hips — the hub 
 
of four limbs reaching 
for arabesque. Still, 
Hikari is poised 
 
to figure it out. 
Her mum and dad, 
somebody tells me, 
 
teach boring dancing. 
Ballroom dancing? 
That’s what I said. 
 

Confidence Tricks

 
Bury any Doubt 
 
A hammock strung between 
two ways of talking. 
 
Not a ripple from 
the still pond of her. 
 
 
Mock the Difficulty 
 
In laughing fits 
as her mother again 
 
tears from the Twix 
the translation sticker. 
 
 
Stand by Your Version 
 
Inscribed in soap, a fingernail 
pronounced baby moon
 
After the carp at Nezu Shrine 
Fish! Fish! for a crow’s feather. 
 
Two triangles for wings. 
To close the elevator, to rise 
 
press 
                     Butterfly! 
 
 
Practice on the Sly 
 
Turning over in 
her sleep her hands 
 
sign to someone deaf 
to the dream. 
 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brent Kininmont usually lives in Tokyo. He returned to New Zealand in 2007 to complete the MA in Creative Writing at Victoria.