Poems: steamy nights and rain-drenched days
In this week’s Poet’s Corner, Adelaide Hills poet Sue Cook looks at what has been our summer of contrasts.
Sheet Wrangling
Late last night
angling for sleep
we tossed and turned
in the summer hot-bed
wrangling the top sheet
into twists and tangles
and dangling our feet
over the edge like reluctant swimmers
dipping toes into the pool
unable to dive in and float
into dreamless sleep.
Water, water everywhere
God kindly turned the taps on in heaven
but left the water running over Christmas ‒
he was otherwise fully occupied.
The louring looming scowling clouds
overburdened, unleashed their cargo
on the sodden sullen suburbs
the swelling crops half-way harvested
lush vineyards & summer market gardens
serried rows of fruit trees, ripe for picking.
Prayers for rain & earth’s fair bounty
are transmuted into intercessions
for healing sunshine to rehabilitate
the flood-drunk landscape.
Sue Cook is an Adelaide Hills poet. As a senior English teacher, for a number of years she edited the South Australian English Teachers Association’s annual poetry anthology “Spring Poetry Festival”. She launched the 2010 edition as guest poet, and her poetry has also appeared in Friendly Street anthologies, literary journals and magazines. Her first book of collected poems is “In Focus”, Ginninderra Press, 2016.
