{"id":8559,"date":"2011-09-27T06:30:27","date_gmt":"2011-09-26T17:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=8559"},"modified":"2011-09-26T21:49:45","modified_gmt":"2011-09-26T08:49:45","slug":"tuesday-poem-the-begonias","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2011\/09\/27\/tuesday-poem-the-begonias\/","title":{"rendered":"Tuesday Poem: “The Begonias”"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Begonias<\/h4>\n

Mal pushes
\neach seedling down,
\ngrime lining
\nthe cracks in her hands,
\neyes narrowed
\nagainst the sun’s
\nlow angle.\u00a0 Usually
\nshe crams her hair up
\nbeneath an old hat\u2014the floppy kind
\nthat cricketers wear\u2014
\nbut today the hat is perched
\namongst magnolia stellata<\/em>
\nand Mal’s hair
\nis a fraying rope
\nthat follows the curve
\nof her spine, swinging
\nto every movement
\nof bend forward, sit back,
\nas she pauses, wiping
\ndirt across her face.\u00a0 “I thought
\nyou didn’t like begonias,”
\nI say.\u00a0 Mal shrugs.
\n“Mum always planted them here.
\nI thought I might as well \u2026”
\nShe seizes the hat,
\npulls it low
\nacross her eyes.<\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

(c) Helen Lowe<\/p>\n

Published in moments in the whirlwind<\/strong><\/em>, Ed. Barbara Strang, NZ Poetry Society, 2009<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>To read the featured poem on the Tuesday Poem Hub<\/strong> and other great poems from fellow Tuesday poets around the world, click here<\/strong><\/a> or on the Quill<\/strong> icon<\/strong> in the sidebar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Begonias Mal pushes each seedling down, grime lining the cracks in her hands, eyes narrowed against the sun’s low angle.\u00a0 Usually she crams her hair up beneath an old hat\u2014the floppy kind that cricketers wear\u2014 but today the hat is perched amongst magnolia stellata and Mal’s hair is a fraying rope that follows the […]<\/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-8559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8559","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=8559"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8559\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8565,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8559\/revisions\/8565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}