Issue 13: Kerrin Sharpe
the stars are the tongues of their shoes
i.m. marc and eddy verbessem deaf twins
who chose death over blindness
the stars are the tongues of their shoes
and guide marc and eddy to a pasture
where they work as cobblers
and make sanctuary slippers
from the hair of premature calves
for angels only lent the silence
suits them their soft faced hammers
do the talking their stitches are never
angry though they use cross and
long armed cross they choose
the winnowing fork and line the threshing floor
with the leather of lamb
to rescue and repair
6,000,000 jewish shoes
so they still walk
their never forgotten song
because the horse expected nothing
because the horse
expected nothing
he was never spared
Flanders Somme Passchendaele
because the horse
never objected
he never bothered
flies mud snow
because the horse
never wore hair extensions
he never groomed
the guns the maps the strategies
because the horse
never saw a cenotaph
he never knew the soldiers
inside his stone coat
when the train stole us
our brother was still born
he was never the light foot
of snow but the dark cry
of rolling stock frankfurt
hamburg nedland lloyd
our suitcases grew the teeth
of an ss bank account
our hair became rope
even our shoes were forced
to dig mass graves
before they were shot
the stars folded our jackets
after we fell
the sound was yellow
Kerrin is a poet and teacher of creative writing. She completed the Victoria University Original Composition Programme taught by Bill Manhire in 1976. Her poems have appeared in many journals including Hue & Cry, JAAM, The Listener, Poetry NZ, Sport, Takahe, Turbine, The London Grip, Snorkel and The Press, Best NZ Poems 08, 09, 10 and 12, and The Best of the Best New Zealand Poems. In 2008 she was awarded the New Zealand Post Creative Writing Teachers’ award from the Institute of Modern Letters. Her debut poetry collection three days in a wishing well was published by Victoria University Press in late 2012. A selection of her poems appeared in Oxford Poets 2013 published by Carcanet Press. Three poems were published in Blackbox Manifold 10. Kerrin’s second collection of poetry, there’s a medical name for this,was published by Victoria University Press in 2014.
