For Easter

Two letters X and P I saw set down
in order, clean and white as bones
upon a neglected earthpage covered with fungus
like grey moss but the propelling letters shone through
and a thumb-nail nicked corner of the sky
while human heads leaned dark across the mountain.

from the poem 'A Painting by Colin McCahon'
written by Janet Frame published in The pocket mirror
published Pegasus, 1968 pp.105-6