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Why Don’t You Talk To Me?
Why Don’t You Talk To Me? - Alistair Te Ariki Campbell
Why Don’t You Talk To Me?
Why do I post my love letters
in a hollow log?
Why put my lips to a knothole in a tree
and whisper your name?
The spiders spread their nets
and catch the sun,
and by my foot in the dry grass
ants rebuild a broken city.
Butterflies pair in the wind,
and the yellow bee,
his holsters packed with bread,
rides the blue air like a drunken cowboy.
More and more I find myself
talking to the sea.
I am alone with my footsteps.
I watch the tide recede
and I am left with miles of shining sand.
Why don’t you talk to me?
from Collected Poems 1947-1981 (Alister Taylor, 1981), © Alistair Te Ariki Campbell 1981, used by permission of the author. Recording from the Waiata New Zealand Poetry Sound Archive 1974.