Tuesday Poem: “Van Gogh in Aotearoa” by Siobhan Harvey
Van Gogh in Aotearoa
The spirit is alive
in Starry Night reproductions
which hang, like crucifixes,
in varsity bed-sits,
petit bourgeois do-ups
and nouveau riche villas
across Aotearoa.
In such replicas, he’s reborn,
picks up his paintbrushes
and begins to set the All Blacks:
McCaw, Howlett, So’oialo,
upon the terra firma of his canvas
as if they’re men at work, harvesting.
Then, he finds his Arles in Akaroa,
where Port Louis-Philippe’s spectre
besets him with visions,
small prophecies, of fresh work:
Landscape under a Summer Sky,
The Rue Jolie Bridge at Akaroa,
Three White Cottages in Rue Balguerie.
Soon, forgetting sunflowers,
he forms a fresh muse
from the soleil-radiance
of kaka-beak and kowhai.
Finally, like Rangi and Papa,
he brings land and sky together
in a blue-black darkness
above the Desert Road
where stars are birthed so crisply
they stand in place of him
and speak of things long dead.
(c) Siobhan Harvey
Reproduced here with the permission of the poet.
—
About the Poem:
Van Gogh in Aotearoa was first published in Landfall 215, (Otago University Press) 2008, and reproduced in Crest to Crest: Impressions of Canterbury Prose & Poetry, ed. Karen Zelas (Wily Publications) 2009.
In terms of why I have chosen it as my Tuesday Poem—quite simply, I have loved Van Gogh in Aotearoa ever since Siobhan Harvey read it for a Women on Air: Plains 96.9 FM interview: I think because of how strongly it evokes a spirit of place, juxtaposing the reality of New Zealand culture and landscape against the enduring wonder of Van Gogh’s art in a sleight-of-word of poetic magic-realism.
—
About the Poet:
Siobhan Harvey is the editor of Our Own Kind: 100 New Zealand Poems about Animals (Godwit, 2009) and Words Chosen Carefully: New Zealand Writers in Discussion (Cape Catley, 2010). She’s Poetry Editor of Takahe magazine and Consulting Editor of International Literary Quarterly. Her first New Zealand poetry collection, Lost Relatives will be launched in Christchurch next March as part of 2011 Book Month.
—
To read the featured poem on the Tuesday Poem Blog—and link to other Tuesday Poets posting around NZ and the world—either click here or on the Quill icon in the sidebar.
Good choice Helen. I too respond to this poem. Imagine what the painter would have made of vastness of the Canterbury Plains or magpies in a gum tree.
I like the visualness of the poem, too—that I can “see” it so clearly, both from experience, the ‘starry night’ above Akaroa or the Desert Road, as well as imagination: as though Van Gogh means a way of looking at the world as well as a particular person with a paintbrush in a specific place/space/time. And “of course” is both …
What rich pickings we have for poetry with such words as kaka-beak and kowhai and our All Blacks as men of the harvest – Te Reo, French and the good old Desert Road painting a new Van Gogh canvas.
I particularly like the way this poem catches the vividness of those images in lines like:
” … he brings land and sky together
in a blue-black darkness
above the Desert Road”
My favourite line is ‘where stars are birthed so crisply’ and how can you go wrong with a name like So’oialo in a poem.
I agree, a brilliant line … and you are quite right about “So’oialo”! 🙂
Some of my favourite poems and stories work by bringing utterly disparate things together and setting them to work on each other – this poem is a great example.
According to this morning’s Dominion Post, Rodney So’oialo may have reached the end of the line in his rugby career with Wellington, so this new setting for him comes at a most appropriate time!
Good to see the blend of history/art/NZ/words in Siobhan’s poem. It reminds me of the Marian Maguire exhibition “The Labours of Herakles”.