Whittling

Colleen Z Burke

Scrolls of rock 
unfurl into turbulent seas
waves claw the sky 
white plumes of water 
cascade air  
battering headlands    
sculpted   eroded 
by time   weather  
cliffs   rocks carved    
shaped by querulous 
winds   waves
my body whittled 
worn away by life
sometimes bursts
into blossoms 
briefly holding at bay 
winter’s inevitable 
            decline and decay

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Colleen Z Burke’s most recent and twelfth poetry collection is Sculpting a landscape, 2019. She has also published two memoirs The Waves Turn and The Human Heart is a Bold Traveller and is co-editor of the anthology The Turning Wave: Poems and Songs of Irish Australia.

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