Poet Jane Hirshfield said "... the feeling I have about poem-writing (is) that it is always an exploration, of discovering something I didn't already know. Who I am shifts from moment to moment, year to year. What I can perceive does as well. A new poem peers into mystery, into whatever lies just beyond the edge of knowable ground."

I bring a different poem to the writing classes each week, not only to inspire but to introduce new poets to the group members.

The Bird by Glenn Colquhoun

My grandfather was a bird.

Underneath his white hair
he wore crayon-coloured feathers.

They were of broiling gold
and of burning red
and of drowning blue.

One was green the colour of a single blade of grass.

When he walked ahead of me
I could see from his stride how he flew
in the branches of trees.

When his hand curled in my hair
I could feel him perching around me.

When he worked on the end of a shovel
I found how his arms spread wide in a turn.

And when he stood over a bed full of flowers
I saw that his eyes gathered what shone
on the ground for his nest.

When he was gone I remember him sitting in a tree
in a garden which he had planted.

And all the cries of morning were around him.

~ From The Art of Walking Upright (Steele Roberts Ltd, 1999)