Sawtooth Banksia

The Rev. Canon Dr. James M. McPherson

Sawtooth Banksia

 

it stood just past the chookyard where

the ridge began to fall away; its gnarled

and knobbly bark made climbing easy,

 

and its limbs formed a convenient eyrie

where I would sit to rack and riddle through

my boyhood’s everyday conundrums;

 

now I rack and riddle Goldengrove's

unleaving, and can see how I’ve been

moulded to the treeness of my tree;

 

at funerals, I baulk at the oh-so- lovely

flowers’ doomed attempt to sugarcoat

the crucible of grief, and yearn instead

 

for what the eyrie taught me:

the stark and fireborn Banksia’s

rugged beauty of defiant hope

 

© the Revd Jim McPherson

Image www.taxateca.com

Banksias, from the family, Proteaceae, are Australian trees dating from the Gondwana period. Banksia seeds need fire to trigger their germination (pyriscence), hence the term, ‘fireborn’.