Some Things to Place in a Coffin
IT IS INTERESTING HOW OFTEN PALL-BEARERS comment that the coffin they carried was ‘heavier than expected’. Even though we haven’t figured out the exact weight of a person’s soul, we still expect their body to be lighter, less of a burden, that a body without life will weigh less. I, too, have held the mantle of coffin carrier—for an aunt, for both my grandmothers and for my mother-in-law—and I know the comment well. What on earth did they put in there? None of them was easy to carry in heels.
At Victoria University’s Top Writers night in May 2017, poet Bill Manhire read his eulogy to Ralph Hotere, ‘Some Things to Place in a Coffin’. I was there, and it moved me to tears; I could feel Frank Christmas in the room. My sister, who was with me, wished she had been able to attend Poppa’s funeral (of course, she couldn’t have; she hadn’t even been born). That night, we spoke about what we would have put in his coffin, if we could go back in time.
When the last of the wine had been drunk, I bundled up my courage and took a moment to thank Bill for his poem ‘Erebus Voices’, which he wrote for Sir Edmund Hillary to read at the thirtieth anniversary service on the ice. (This is the same poem that my aunt Denise read at the commemorations in Antarctica the following year.) Bill’s beautiful words watch over me every day as I write and polish this manuscript for my grandfather. Even now, I glance up and see the verses hovering above my desk (‘The Mountain’, ‘The Dead’). Despite being stuck to the wall with greying Blu-Tack, the page curled and yellowing in the Hawke’s Bay sun, this poem encourages me. Onwards.
So, with all the love I can muster, here is my ode to Frank for the things I was never able to place in his coffin (with a little inspiration from Bill, of course).
Some Things to Place in a Coffin (for Frank)
A plumb bob, a drill bit, a box of old tools
Your handwriting, scribbled on a dwang or a beam.
Bear hugs, a chook house
A green thumb, green beans
New potatoes, your potatoes
Espaliered trees.
A collection of foreign coins
Dollars, lira, pounds
Cocktail sticks, matchbooks
A nephew, just like you.
A lost chisel found in a wall, etched H. F. C.
Your pencil and set square
Blueprints, permits.
A camera.
A quart.
The Stations of the Cross.
Medals and scars.
Divining rod, compendium
A shadow cast
Ko Taranaki te maunga
Whanganui, Fitzroy, Waitara River
A surf caster
A set net and a pair of gumboots
Two eggs, a little flour, and some butter for frying.
Dirty laundry
That bloody camera
And one
ticket.
Lobster, champagne
Over ice
In ice.
15.3 / 2 / 4
Ko Erebus te maunga
Your right foot
A shirt, a tie and a pair of cut-off pants
Dental records, fingerprints
A twenty-first and two weddings
Four children
Nine grandchildren
And ten great-grandchildren.
A handkerchief, embroidered F.
An orchid (corsage)
59 candles
And your name, repeated.