Hey, how you doing? Don’t worry
I’ll sit over here – like you, where the sand is dry.
I’ll help you watch the tide.
I’m good thanks. Yes,
I like to come by after work when I can. I guess
I’m putting off getting back home.
You’ve a nice place here, with the dunes
and the stream from the hills behind.
No, I haven’t forgotten the sea.
Nor the rip that carries you out at your ease …
I’ve noticed you always swim on your own
and withdraw up here to shelter alone in the lap of the cliffs.
I do have the family, true, and love them with all my heart
but sometimes here on the shore
watching the ocean stirring and arching its back
and the clouds pacing the sky
I begin to sense a thread of kinship with you.
This sound absurd?
It’s more to do with the sense of being, underneath it all, alone.
Beneath the bustle of work and the ceaseless interaction of family life
there’s a certain stillness,
there’s a layer of deep undisturbable quiet:
a solitude like your own.
Or perhaps it’s a feeling … pervasive, imprecise …
of being at one with the elemental world:
air and water; or atoms … then the timeless aeons …
But you’ve lowered your head to the slope of the sand
and look as though you’ll doze; perhaps I’ll do the same.
We can lie beached like waka
and listen to the riddles of the sea;
there is no hurry to go.
©John Looker 2020
This was Highly Commended in New Zealand’s Caselberg Trust International Poetry Prize 2020. For all the winning poems, please go to:
https://www.caselbergtrust.org/news/read-the-2020-winning-poems

The actor Peter Hayden reading ‘Conversation with a sea lion’, Dunedin university bookshop, Nov 2020.
This is stunning, John!
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By: elainestirling on 25 November, 2020
at 15:34
Thanks Elaine!
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By: John Looker on 25 November, 2020
at 15:43
Absolutely love this, John. What a scene you paint!
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By: Thomas Davis on 25 November, 2020
at 15:47
Thank you Tom!
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By: John Looker on 25 November, 2020
at 15:53
Congrats on the highly commended and the reading thereof, John. I’m always amazed how a poet – such as yourself – manages to evoke such strong feelings via the most “prosaic” of things such as a sea lion. Marvellous!
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By: Bruce - Weave a Web on 25 November, 2020
at 17:41
That’s very good of you Bruce, thank you – I can say the same about your writing. Keep it up!
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By: John Looker on 25 November, 2020
at 22:33
Familiar ground, Johnno, stripped back.
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By: peterbowes on 25 November, 2020
at 21:02
Thanks Pete – good to hear from you!
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By: John Looker on 25 November, 2020
at 22:34
Blown away by this. A silent interaction that anyone can tune into without ever having imagined themselves in such a scene. The language makes the backdrop to the introspection so vivid that you can smell the sea. I love this poem, but I find I can’t express how it reaches me. Anyway, thank you.
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By: hilarycustancegreen on 25 November, 2020
at 22:22
That is extremely kind of you Hilary. Thank you.
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By: John Looker on 25 November, 2020
at 22:35
John, what is (a) waka? I shared your poem with a friend and she looked the word up and found the following: Waka (poetry), a genre of Japanese poetry. WAKA (TV), a television station licensed to Selma, Alabama, US. Waka music, a musical genre from Yorubaland of Nigeria. Waga sculpture or waka, a type of Ethiopian memorial statue. – none of these quite made sense to her in the context. I simply thought of other sea creatures or driftwood, but I like the idea of Ethiopian Memorial statues.
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By: hilarycustancegreen on 10 December, 2020
at 16:28
Just looked up New Zealand plus waka and got it!
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By: hilarycustancegreen on 10 December, 2020
at 16:32
I’m impressed at your research Hilary! And thank you for sharing the poem with a friend – I can’t think of any greater compliment. 😊
Any New Zealander of course would know that waka are canoes, a Māori and South Pacific word, but I’ve learnt that some historical waka should more fairly be described as small ships. Two could be lashed together with a platform between, given two impressive masts, and then used to transport a hundred men, women, children, their goods and animals in migration across the Pacific. However, in my poem I was obviously thinking of canoe-length waka.
Thank you again!
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By: John Looker on 10 December, 2020
at 17:25
Congratulations John, and what a magnificent poem!
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By: The Cheesesellers Wife on 26 November, 2020
at 16:05
Thanks Kim, I’m pleased you enjoyed it. 😊
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By: John Looker on 26 November, 2020
at 16:44
I thoroughly enjoyed this, John. Congratulations!
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By: Betty Hayes Albright on 28 November, 2020
at 04:06
Hi Betty – and thank you. J
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By: John Looker on 28 November, 2020
at 07:45