{"id":43754,"date":"2026-04-20T06:30:32","date_gmt":"2026-04-19T18:30:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=43754"},"modified":"2026-04-19T21:18:22","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T09:18:22","slug":"the-begonias-a-tuesday-poem-reprised","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2026\/04\/20\/the-begonias-a-tuesday-poem-reprised\/","title":{"rendered":"“The Begonias” — A Tuesday Poem Reprised"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Not a begonia \ud83d\ude09<\/p><\/div>\n

In the spirit of last Thursday’s post<\/a> on repaying my arrears to the garden (a repayment that has continued apace \ud83d\ude00 ), I thought it was time to revisit The Begonias<\/em>, previously featured here as a Tuesday Poem. It was published in moments in the whirlwind<\/em><\/strong>, the NZ Poetry Anthology in 2009.<\/p>\n

The Begonias<\/span><\/h4>\n

Mal pushes<\/span>
\neach seedling down,<\/span>
\ngrime lining<\/span>
\nthe cracks in her hands,<\/span>
\neyes narrowed<\/span>
\nagainst the sun\u2019s<\/span>
\nlow angle.\u00a0 Usually<\/span>
\nshe crams her hair up<\/span>
\nbeneath an old hat\u2014the floppy kind<\/span>
\nthat cricketers wear\u2014<\/span>
\nbut today the hat is perched<\/span>
\namongst magnolia stellata<\/em><\/span>
\nand Mal\u2019s hair<\/span>
\nis a fraying rope<\/span>
\nthat follows the curve<\/span>
\nof her spine, swinging<\/span>
\nto every movement<\/span>
\nof bend forward, sit back,<\/span>
\nas she pauses, wiping<\/span>
\ndirt across her face.\u00a0 \u201cI thought<\/span>
\nyou didn\u2019t like begonias,\u201d<\/span>
\nI say.\u00a0 Mal shrugs.<\/span>
\n\u201cMum always planted them here.<\/span>
\nI thought I might as well \u2026\u201d<\/span>
\nShe seizes the hat,<\/span>
\npulls it low<\/span>
\nacross her eyes.<\/span><\/p>\n

(c) Helen Lowe<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the spirit of last Thursday’s post on repaying my arrears to the garden (a repayment that has continued apace \ud83d\ude00 ), I thought it was time to revisit The Begonias, previously featured here as a Tuesday Poem. It was published in moments in the whirlwind, the NZ Poetry Anthology in 2009. The Begonias Mal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43754"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43754\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43755,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43754\/revisions\/43755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}