Te Mata

Up the back of our valley
there's a mountain blue with distance.
All day it gazes down
at our houses by the sea –
tin dinghies becalmed in sun baked back yards
water tanks on wooden towers.
It soars above a boundary fence
to take in the smallest view –
this room whose wide window is as open as the day.
It reads like a half read book
a smoked fish left on the table
as if it were a poem
needing only salt and pepper.

Bob Orr