Sketch
I’m going to draw this poem for you
so you can see what I can see:
in this small stratosphere so much
is silhouetted starkly against a plain backdrop
I’m taking a large square sheet of white drawing paper
and at the top I’m drawing a butterfly with flapping wings,
strange to see one so high, tissue wings
fighting to stay in shape against the wind
from the right is a knife-edged swoop of swallow
with forked tail in iconic shape
I’ll colour its wings Prussian Blue
and add a glaze of glimmer
a ladle of Terracotta on its upper breast
in the background, upper left,
I’ll draw a suggestion of the cluster
of gulls and ibises
hanging handkerchief-hemmed
errant stragglers, drifting, chilling
and then the showpiece, new to me,
the friendly currawong on a glass pane
of the balcony
Ivory Black with flashes of Chinese White
on tail and edges of wings
eye of Deep Cadmium
soft Silver Grey beak with predatory hook
I could use a 2B pencil for this, dark and fine
better than the soft and smudgy 4B’s
de rigueur for writing music
So! I’m ready to go
when he drops kamikaze
against the background void
simply falls, free-falls
into the blank air
legs straight
wings clasped to sides
as he was before,
dropping so fast I don’t see
his wings open
I only see this performer’s
fierce prowess of DNA – falling with flair
into greedy gravity,
confident that he will fling open
his safety-net wings
like black matador’s capes
diverting a trajectory of fated death
How could my cartoon of a stick-figure-black-bird
straight legs hanging like a child’s drawing
convey the glorious potency of skill
the savage clasp on life
against this pallid background
of unremarkable Sky Blue?
- © Erina Booker 2021
Erina Booker is a Sydney-based poet. She has published eight collections of her work, and contributes to journals, internationally, in Australia, and online. She enjoys giving recitals, seminars, and judging competitions. Erina has a Major in Literature within her Bachelor of Arts degree, and a Postgraduate degree in Counselling. Her interests are extensive and never-ending.
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