By Benedict St Quentin Fitzpatrick
Turning I saw you
once
so clear
shadows move the grasses
silent winds
sift the debris slowly
around your feet
the red earth
moist
crossed with signs of night
tracks that soften
and fade
still
you remain.
My online friend Ben is an Aussie poet whom I first encountered — like so many others — on MySpace, back in the day. It seems to me that his poetry just keeps getting better and better. I first knew him as a writer of beautiful haiku and tanka. As you see, he also writes longer poems. Many focus on the Australian landscape and his close relationship with it since childhood. I love them for this reason, and also because they are poems of understatement and deceptively simple language.
I also love the mystery in the poem I've chosen: its quiet acceptance of the ineffable.
If you're on facebook, you'll find this and other poems in his Notes there. Also he has started a poetry blog on Wordpress.
Another of Ben's passions is archery. He lists his religion as Buddhist. I always think there is a Samurai-like quality in the clarity of his poetry.
Poems and photos used in ‘I Wish I’d Written
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