Blakely's Red Gum Poem by Timoshenko Aslanides

In discerning you from a distance with such ease,
I identify myself; grey bark, peeling in patches
like the skin which sometimes flakes from around the neck
of even a hybrid like me. Your burn, though,
shows as pleasure, the glow of which comes after pleasure,
or the satisfactioin of giving it.

Know now that I am native to Canberra, flowering in summer,
and from the Tuggeranong, valleyof sharp winds,
present and preside over sunsets that visitors
in their millions drive wide roads to admire.
(Watch from the long grass near the old hollow limbs
that give night possums, and the late silence of stars.)