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  • Charades with Freya (7)
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Charades with Freya (7)

Diana Hendry

Animals are easy. I can do penguin waddle,
hoppy frog, snappy croc. And Actions – all
those ings – dancing, eating, sleeping – are a doddle.

It’s Objects that test me to my limits. To become guitar
I must hollow out the sound-hole of my heart;
open the door of myself to become room;
let go of love to lift the lighthearted balloon
How get the measure of myself and become ruler?
Where’s the river god to turn me into tree? How flower?

Animals, Actions, Objects – we put the cards back in the tin.
Quick as a flash I’m gran.


Diana Hendry

from Second Wind (Saltire Society, 2015)
no. 9 in the Saltire Society’s pamphlet series

Reproduced by permission of the author.

Tags:

ageing animals games grandparents language metamorphosis Second Wind suitable for children

About this poem

In 2015 the Scottish Poetry Library commissioned poets Douglas Dunn, Vicki Feaver and Diana Hendry to write on the theme of age. Their poems appear together in Second Wind as part of the Saltire Society’s pamphlet series. The project as a whole is supported by The Baring Foundation, as one of its series of ‘Late Style’ artist commissions.

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Diana Hendryb.1941

Diana Hendry is a poet, short story writer and the author of many children’s books.
More about Diana Hendry

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