ROAD MAP.
"Maps are of place, not time, nor can they say The surprising height and colour of a building, Nor where the groups of people bar the way." OT even of place, this map we will follow in dark country: The curve of a pen is bound, it is shadow show To a stranger wondering how deep are the gorges, At what height will there be snow? MAPS are of compass points, until the traveller Comes home again. Then place and time, as no map ever gave, Have embraced the fearful thrust of a mountain, The green menace of a wave. OR all was unexpected that we found; Rivers were marked, but what map could foretell The scouring of spring floods, the changed ford, How the great boulders fell? HERE is no absolute of place to be drawn In neat precision with a mapping pen: Lakes are hemmed in by thought as well as hills, That has branched through many men. AND what bald estimate, in feet, of a mountain ‘Will give to the unfamiliar, setting out, The awe of a white peak marching up the valley, And the summits long shout? HE journey will people the map with recollection; Place will be etched more clearly, sharpened in light Where time has set: now there is left to wonder Will this be beautiful by night? PLACE will be integrate, but not on paper; The mind’s net flung and hauled, it is a silver catch; Here was the limestone bluff, the sharp bend, There was iced snow to watch, UT later, in what deep valley of hesitation We consider time, and place, and thought As tiny scratches on what surface, an ultimate ‘No map, or mind, has caught.
Paul
Henderson
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 22, Issue 547, 16 December 1949, Page 17
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290ROAD MAP. New Zealand Listener, Volume 22, Issue 547, 16 December 1949, Page 17
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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