Knitting Circle

Knitting Circle

I join the circle on the road where poets knit and chat
And trucks are stopped, and can’t break through, we never leave a gap

& next to me is Dickinson, with needles on attack
They’re lightning’s fire and medicine choir and visions’ holy facts

& Isaiah Two he wanders through from his walk up on the ridge
With tales of squawking keas who’ll never give an inch

Its locals who protect them with a predator-proof fence
While Isaiah Two sings’ blessings true which rise as loves’ incense

And Emily’s needles flash and dash, and also go click clack
While Isaiah mumbles in his beard, that’s another truck turned back

So the chat, it turns to predators; and Australian mining shares
And Sirens float, which loses hope, as investors disappear

As Matariki rises in the dark we knit on through the night
While Isaiah grumbles from his dreams, these Kiwis sure can fight

‘Knitting circle:’ The poem is dedicated to the ‘knitting nanas’ of the Stop Adani Campaign, in the Southern Galilee Basin, Queensland, Australia

Emily Dickinson: 1830 -1886; Pioneering American poet, who has been recognised as a lightning poet, and medicine woman.

Isaiah Two; according to textual analysis Isaiah 2 is one of a school of prophetic poets who created the Book of Isaiah

Squawking keas; there are keas protected by locals on the ridge above Sam’s Creek