Drawing by Judith Wolfe
John Murphy
Poem
EASTER ISLAND
Sailing eastward from Polynesia
They homed in where cliff-face and sea
Provided eatables well worth one's wits.
Frigates politely placed their Easter eggs
Where joyous folk clambered, legs on ledges.
Waves treadled rafts shaped from coconut palm
Out to known borders where lines stitched up fish.
Famine came and they ate one another.
Good tides swashed back; they filled up from the sea.
Their massive stone statues have ramrod backs,
Eyes turned inland towards those that fashioned them.
Broken sockets, eye-parts, have been gathered
And fitted, delicately as crystal.
Today those eyes catch light so pure, they gleam.