A Question Bigger than a Hawk

Questions burrow through the fourth poetry collection by Jan FitzGerald. An only child until a brother appears in a cradle one day, she wonders about the circumstances of her birth and delves into the memories she has of a childhood in 1950s Tauranga - making traps for birds that she cares for in her bedroom, raiding feijoas, shelling peas at Christmas and befriending kuia waiting for their train.

The poet marvels, too, at the world around her - from her beloved birds to the wildness of storms - and is angry at the mess we've made of it. Then, like everyone, she is aghast when nature turns, as it has done with the pandemic, and shows a different face - one we have no manual for. In A Question Bigger than a Hawk, Jan FitzGerald writes with urgency and compassion, allowing little to escape her keen and restless eye.