Couplings

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COUPLINGS

cicada sing summer songs

few loves have much renown - Helen’s
chance, her embrace of Paris rather
than her face launched the thousand
ships that gave the place such fame.

like most of us, of those long ago
couplings, immense in their intensity
all that remains is fickle memory
the price we pay for being animal.

wheel-chair bound
I watch with dismay
white butterflies
lay eggs on the rocket seedlings.

Harvey McQueen

This poem from my just released collection ‘Goya Rules’ was published in yesterday’s Dominion Post.