NORFOLK
ISLAND PINES
AT DUSK
In a civilisation
dominated by the prosaic, by data and purely intellectual models of
the real, there is a threat of creative stagnation and loss of human
meaning. I believe that poetry is an art that can, perhaps more than
most, give back something of the mystery and immediacy of actual
experience.
The Norfolk Island
Pines mentioned in this piece are endemic to Norfolk Island.
Araucaria
heterophylla (synonym A.
excelsa) is a vascular plant in the ancient and now
disjointly distributed conifer family Araucariaceae. As its
vernacular name Norfolk
Island pine implies, the tree is endemic to Norfolk
Island, a small island in the Pacific Ocean between New Zealand and
New Caledonia, about 1440 km east of Sydney, Australia. The genus
Araucaria occurs across the South Pacific, especially concentrated in
New Caledonia (about 700 km due north of Norfolk Island) where
13 closely related and similar-appearing species are found. It is
sometimes called a star
pine, triangle tree or
living Christmas tree, due to its symmetrical shape as
a sapling, although it is not a true pine. From Wikipedia
NORFOLK
ISLAND
PINES
AT DUSK
Wide
autumn waves lap last gold light
that
fades from west line’s burning sight.
Four
Norfolk pines, dusk-dark,
upon
a seaside hill
stand
tall.
Sky
sentinels, they raise
their
needled branches high
towards
violet sky vastness,
ethereal
and far.
And
in light-melting western haze,
behind
pines’ silhouetted sharpness,
now
Venus is
first-blazing
star.
