Poetry Thursday - Les Murray

"the white poplars' underworld advance" (image from here)

In the chapter about a rookery in his "Wildwood: a journey through trees" Roger Deakin quotes Australian poet Les Murray: "Shade makes colours loom and be thoughtful."

You need to go here (the Australian Poetry Library, a wonderful resource) to read the entire poem, which is called "Rooms of the Sketch-Garden". To whet your appetite, here are a few lines, those that precede the quote above, when Murray talks of trying to grow shade in his garden:

A graphite-toned background of air
it features red, focusses yellow.
Blue diffusing through it rings the firebell.

I also love "the heron-brought // igniting propane-blue waterlily"

At the end, the "indigo waterhen" makes a brief appearance.

Shades of cool blue, in a place where "the drought sun" can bear down "like dementia."