Authority

Finuala Dowling


She’s glad she didn’t inherit my curly hair

and that I don’t try to act young

that I’d never join her at happy hour

or make her a friend on Facebook

or be on Facebook at all

or gate-crash her parties.

She sighs when she has to help me with my phone

or when I wear two pairs of sunglasses at the same time;

laughs when I ask “So what’s this festival called

‘Burn it all up in the Karoo’?”

But when she sits by the kettle with her friend

and the two blonde heads talk in depth about life:

– How do we heal things? How do we solve things?

Is this love? And who are we anyway? –

all I hear is:

“My mom says my mom says my mom says my mom says”

From: McGregor Poetry Anthology 2013

Published by African Sun Press in association with the McGregor Poetry Festival

ISBN number 978-0-620-62302-5


The Poet:

Finuala Dowling is a poet, novelist and creative writing teacher. Her poetry has won the Ingrid Jonker Prize, the Sanlam Prize and the Olive Schreiner Prize. She has read at the Aldeburgh Festival, at Snape Maltings and at all major South African literary festivals.