She stood at the gate
of the local mosque
where a river of flowers
lined the fence alongside her.
She stood at the gate
wearing a black hijab
though she was a European
New Zealander, like so
many other non Muslim
women in new Zealand,
like Maori, Chinese, Samoan
women sharing the brunt
of white supremacist gibes
with Muslim women daily.
She stood at the gate
her bushmaster rifle ready,
flowers stuck into her
gun harness like her fellow
uniformed police officers
ready for more attacks.
lifecameos 
Very moving. Your observations of our current world society are excellent.
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Thank you very much.
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I wish all these white supremacists…would wake up and smell the coffee.. This is an excellant poem as well…From the woman’s perspective.
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Thank you very much. I saw her photo in the newspaper, cropped closely around her and it looked really stark.
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Here in certain state governments certain bills are trying to limit what people can put on their own heads. I shake my head in total disbelief.
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I did wonder if her police hat would have given her some protection. However she would have had to be OK’ed by senior officers I am sure, and she was probably one of the many officers standing guard at mosques around the country, or at the Christchurch Friday afternoon Muslim prayers which had to be held out in the park the Friday after the shootings. They could not get back into the mosque for several more days. Many officers in our news were bareheaded, both male and female. Maybe they were trying make them more informal. A lot of the police officers tucked flowers in their gun / ammunition harnesses too.
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I think they are also saying Yes are job is to protect but we are human too. This is going to affect everyone for a long time. the flowers make sense too…With all the ugliness in the world…there is the opposite..flowers..Life…
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