As reality descends upon me in the form of course registration, student loans, and car insurance, I would like to hang on to some of the most unreal and happy memories from my travels. I stumbled across this poem a few weeks ago and found peace reflecting on these words as I thought about my time spent in the southern hemisphere.
I will close this chapter of vagabond wandering and settle into my routine, but never boring, life as a Nursing student; and will happily reminisce with anyone interested (maybe along with some NZ wine:) when your travels lead you my way. Hasta la proxima aventura…
New Zealand
"These unshaped islands, on the sawyer's bench,
Wait for the chisel of the mind,
Green canyons to the south, immense and passive,
Penetrated rarely, seeded only
By the deer-culler's shot, or else in the north
Tribes of the shark and the octopus,
Mangroves, black hair on a boxer's hand.
The founding fathers with their guns and bibles,
Botanist, whaler, added bones and names
To the land, to us a bridle
As if the id were a horse: the swampy towns
Like dreamers that struggle to wake,
Longing for the poet's truth
And the lover's pride. Something new and old
Explores its own pain, hearing
The rain's choir on curtains of gray moss
Or fingers of the Tasman pressing
On breasts of hardening sand, as actors
Find their own solitude in mirrors,
As one who has buried his dead,
Able to at last to give with an open hand."
-James K. Baxter (1969)
