Shanty Extravaganza Poem by Diana van den Berg

It was just a simple abode
- somewhere between a hut
and a house –
that photograph –
similar to hundreds more
amongst the thousands
I was working on today,

but oh!
the washing on the line -
dancing in such joyous delight
that I wanted to laugh and leap
with it
and pirouette
and sing -
and their colours so soft and happy
in orange and turquoise
and black and pink and patterned,
imprinted
on my soul
past eternity.

(24 July 2009)