Poetry

The Threepenny Kowhai Stamp Brooch

Jennifer Compton

 

If I get lost someone will pick me up and post me.

I am already licked and stamped on my green lapel.

 

The brooch from Te Papa will see me safely home.

It’s 3^D—as in LSD—pounds, shillings and pence.

 

Let us go out and do the passegiata on the waterfront.

If and when I get lost, you can slide me into the red box.

 

Of course I will be posted back into the past—

back to when kowhai was pronounced kowhai.