At the Zoological Gardens, Melbourne, poems by Diane Fahey.
Diane Fahey is the author of twelve poetry collections, most recently A House by the River. A new collection, November Journal, is forthcoming from Whitmore Press in late 2017. She has received various awards and fellowships for her poetry, and has undertaken residencies in Venice and at Hawthornden Castle, the Tyrone Guthrie Centre, Cill Rialaig, Varuna and Bundanon. She holds a PhD in Creative Writing from UWS. Her website: dianefaheypoet.com
Wompoo fruit-doves
Blow-ins from the North
who’ve ventured down the east coast’s
dwindling rainforests…
Picture-book bright, they beguile
in yellow, plum-purple, green.
Black-faced cuckoo-shrike
Eyes, blackly brilliant.
Its true habitat, alas,
is open woodland.
It speeds through a leafy maze,
back and forth, again, again.
In the parrot precinct
Patagonian
parrots wear landscape colours:
earth, clay, rock. Conures
celebrate high noon; the rest,
bright fruits, leaves, the bluest skies.
Tawny frogmouths
Almost nose to beak
you can watch furred clumps, cute as
kittens, on a bough –
incognito dreamers, eyes
clamped against light, this cage, you.
© Diane Fahey