Ducklings

On city ponds and lakes ducks
bring out their ducklings to
set the city services scrambling.

Firemen turn on a hydrant to
float the ducklings fallen in a deep
drain on their way to the park,
reaching down with their bird net to
scoop them up, place them in the bucket.

Two police officers control traffic
in the mornings along the street where
two ducks cross, each with a line of
ducklings all tottering across to the
lake in the park. Running over
ducklings makes folks squeamish.

Waiting for our bus to exit the park
I become impatient, look out the
window to see why we stopped.
A mother duck steps up to the kerb
followed by a line of ducklings, then
crosses the grass to the lake.

How many of these ducklings
will grow up to be shot in
the countryside during next
winter’s hunting season ?


Previously posted December 2016.

Pukeko

(New Zealand Swamphen)

In the foreground of the seaside scene
the pukeko leans down to peck at
the bare ground. Further back stands
an old colonial house, etched in ink,
delicately tinted in water colours.

A calm pale sea shimmers in the
distance beyond hardy windblown
shrubs on a grassy bank. Gnarled
trees wearing crimson flowers protect
the two storey house inside the white
picket fence beside a tidal stream
seeping over the narrow beach.

Lush arum lilies with thick green
leaves sprawl around the unheeding
bird pecking for tasty tidbits. red
legs, beak, comb blaze against
dark blue plumage and its tail,
upended, flashing a splash of white,
placid, contented, peaceful.

Previously posted December 2016.

Not By Land

Now the shrieking gale
force winds have eased
now the swirling peaks of
mountainous seas have
dropped, imprisoned travellers
gradually leave the seaside
town immured within
its vast rocky landslides.

Helicopters lift off from
sports fields with groups
from long straggling queues,
fly to the city down south.

Naval ships anchor out
sea beyond the perilously
raised rocky seabed.
Small shallow draft boats
ferry food water portaloos
road repair and building supplies
to shore, ferry travellers
back to fill up ships’ cargo
holds for the journey
to the city down south.

Tears flow of exhaustion fear
sleeplessness anxiety, yet
thankful to leave the constant
aftershocks, the shortages,
relieved to travel to a city
where life flows on in its
accustomed routines.


Previously posted December 2016.

Tourist Resort

At the busy resort
with its sandy beach they
dined on crayfish, abalone.
Drowsy after sea breezes
and seafood feasts they
then slept dreamlessly.

Amidst loud roars, bangs,
jolts their motel rocked
to and fro, side to side
up and down, on and on.
They pulled on jackets, fell
blearily outside, away from
buildings, lay down on grassy
spaces throughout the ground
shaking night until dawn.

Grim news after dawn told
of shattered buildings, landslides
over roads, wrecked water
mains and sewers, no electricity,
phone connections all down.
Their holiday was frozen in time.

Now gale force winds for
two days lashed the sea
and mountains around them.


Previously posted December 2016.

Politician’s Truth

“It’s stuffed !” said
the Prime Minister to
the Transport Minister.
Indeed he spoke the truth.
The cameraman beside them
panned down through the
helicopter windows to
smashed up miles of
coastline down below.

Tonnes of fractured rock
in countless cascades
overflowed over road and
railway snaking over the
rocky shore fringing
jagged steep mountains.

Proof of the politician’s truth
was more easily seen than usual.


Previously posted December 2016.

Seashore

In a dull cloudy haze
the bleak rocky coast
lies silent after its midnight
roaring grinding juddering
shaking falling rising.
A broad band of dead
black algae coats pale grey
rocks, broken by clumps of
limp seaweed drooping reaching
down to seawater far below.

The deep chasm stretching
out to sea from the little
coastal town lies eerie, empty
of its whales and playful
dolphins now retreated far
out to sea. Trapped by rocks
trust upwards lie boats that
used to follow them, now
stranded in the newly molded
pond around the wharf.

A vast landslide inters
rocks where fur seals used
to bask, breed, fight, sleep.

Over rocks heaved high above
their former ocean home lie
crayfish corpses past their
last gasp, while abalone bake
in the sun, far from the newly
created high tide line.


Previously posted December 2016.

Venetian Glasses

Six Venetian wine glasses
standing in the china cabinet
while life flows around them.
Too precious to use, to perhaps
be broken like other wine
glasses at gatherings of
twenty and thirty somethings.

An aura of Venetian shops
full of rainbow coloured
glassware, glass etched with
gold and silver suffuses these
six wine glasses, an aura of
gentle lighting reflecting a
myriad of softly frosted
droplets of shop lighting.

They recall shimmering sunny
days with twenty something
friends on our big OE,
roaming Venetian canals and
bridges, eating Mediterranean
food outdoors on leafy piazzas.

Six Venetian wine glasses
gold rimmed, delicately etched
patterns in tiny squares now
dulled, still delighting with the
memories they carry of times
when youth’s chances were
lived to their fullest.


Previously posted December 2016.

Landscapes

At a high northern latitude
the tide’s flowing waters
stream past the grassy
verges on which I stand
bracing myself against the
gusty raucous gales blasting
these Orkney hummocks
huddling down close to
the sea avoiding the
eroding currents of air.
Hummocks sheltering near
each other channelling the
tide into narrow streams.

So strange to stand
taller than the surrounding
grassy landscape devoid of
trees which can only grow
in the shelter of human
habitations and structures.

So foreign to one who
was born to sandy beaches
here under tall forests, steep
farmlands tall mountains
of tussock, rocky scree all
rising as tectonic plates
grind against each other
far below a living landscape.


Previously posted December 2016.

Birthday Book

To Amy … from Grandma … 1895

When Amy turned seven in 1895
Grandma gave her a birthday book
for her beautiful copperplate writing.
Earnestly Amy inscribed birth dates
of her parents, grandparents, siblings,
in the approved handwriting style.
In time the writing became slimmer,
smaller, as a busy housewife and mother
scrawled hastily across the pages.

Now dates of marriages were
entered, births of children, deaths
of parents, of her own generation
flowing across the pages.

But not her grief at the loss of
beloved sisters, her sadness at the
second marriage of her divorced
youngest brother whom she was
not allowed to mention though he
was awarded a military cross
after the battle of Passchendaele.

She did not record the death of
the husband who only wanted a
housekeeper while she yearned for
a lively family home. Nor his second
funeral pyre on which she burned
all the photos from his expensive
cameras, from his own dark room.

She recorded her removal
with her daughter to a
newer smaller home.


Previously posted November 2016.