‘Working All Day’

Sir: I am grateful to your correspondent ‘Marguerite’ for reading my verse so thoroughly. Her comments on my lack of gardening knowledge seem a trifle harsh. I have found that if the ground is deeply trenched and the couch grass well covered, at least some of the grass will rot. At the same time I suspect it is my Puritan heredity that prompts me to this measure. Like a great many of my countrymen, I am inclined to imagine that if an insoluble problem is buried deep enough, and the surface of the ground is optimistically smooth, then the problem is done away with. In this respect I resemble Norman Vincent Peale, most journalists, and all our local politicians, whether they belong to the party of King Log or King Stork.

Your correspondent takes me to task for saying that puha is blood-red. The puha in her own garden may be orange or violet in colour; but the mature plants which grow on the terrace above my house have stalks (attractively translucent when young) the colour of dried blood. I have eaten puha at home and at the Waiwhetu Maori meeting house. It seems to need cooking with pork or corned beef to bring out its slightly rank but interesting flavour.

1960 (228)