Barbados (by Frederick Seidel)

Griffin Prize for Excellence In Poetry, The (2001 - 0)

Original Text

Frederick Seidel, Ooga-Booga (London: Faber and Faber, 2006). This poem is reproduced on the Griffin Prize Web Site (from a volume on the 2006 International Shortlist).

1A cane toad came up to them.

2They’d never seen anything so remarkable.

3Now they could see the field was full of them.

4Suddenly the field is filled with ancestors.

5The hippopotamuses became friendly with the villagers.

6Along came white hunters who shot the friendly hippos dead.

7If they had known that friendship would end like that,

8They never would have entered into it.

9Suddenly the field is filled with souls.

10The field of sugarcane is filled with hippopotamus cane toads.

11They always complained

12Our xylophones were too loud.

13The Crocodile King is dead.

14The world has no end.

RPO poem Editors

Ian Lancashire

RPO Edition

2011