Auckland Poetry

Clara’s Christmas :a sentimental verse

(I met Clara when she was 70 and I was 11 we became great ‘chuckle chums’. She had gone into service before WW1 and had many tales to tell.
The poem is about a Christmas visit when she sat happily smiling and I guess dreaming and could not hear us knocking at her door. )

As we looked in through the window at her silent night room
We saw no sign of sorrow or gloom:
Clara chuckling, dreams of happy play,
Cheered by the warm sights of her Christmas Day:
Singing for Uncle Sam, her young voice was a treat
Dancing like joy for her Aunts on tireless feet
Cuddling her Daddy and when she begins to tire
Saying prayers with her sisters and having a last warm at the fire.
Laughing again years later that the night of waiting was away
Helping her nieces unwrap their fun for their Christmas Day
Saying she’d never seen such a pretty doll in her life
Smiling no she’d never wanted to be a wife.
Gasping in their delight at the lights on the tree
Cradling young
Tracy crying because of a cut knee.

The favourite Aunt, they’d never leave but always love
Alone in her room, sat gentle and quiet as a dove.
The often-brought out Christmas cards standing on the shelf;
So much love waiting in one whom never thought of herself.

We knocked and knocked.
She never heard.
Soon she had died,
With so much life and love locked inside.

Decide whom you can visit for the sake of Christmas Day.
Knock louder than we did and don’t go away.
One day you may be old tired and cold.
Let’s hope,

One looking through your window,

Will see you with something warmer

Than old memories to hold.

Democracy (song contest)

Having suffered watching euro-vision song
contest I do not longer believe in democracy.
Russia won and that’s ok, they had skaters
and acrobats, so what has that to do with
a song? Don’t ask me, her nearest neighbours
liked it; as the Danes liked the Norwegian’s
tune, who in turn voted for the Swedish song

I sit here and can’t remember the wining song
nor can anyone else. Glad Russia won though,
they believe in managed democracy, as I do,
because the stupidity of people makes it clear
they are not yet fit for running anything more
important that a song contest, and giving first
prize to a sweet heifer at an agricultural show.

Eternal Love.

Memory, thinking of you still hurt, you stayed with me,
said you loved me, while waiting for Him to be free;
when he was, you left me, coldly ignoring my feelings.
Love conquers all; but it is also lies, hate and treachery.

Love starts wars, so when I killed him your scream of
Utter hopelessness reverberated, tore large chunks of sky
Into mist and woke god from his slumber. Too late now
For me to understand that your love for him was timeless.

The Tree

I’m the lone tree you see on top of a hill, you
can’t avoid seeing me when you are scanning
the horizon. Yet many claim not to have seen me,
like I should be an anonymous tree in the forest;

I have no defense against the cold wind of change,
but my trunk is solid my leaves still green, a hawk
has its nest in my crown and in a hollow in my
trunk a red fox smile to no one in particular.

I have time wait for the wind to blows itself into
a zephyr that whispers soft words of appreciation,
preferable on a day when the air is so clear that
you can see forever and fly should you wish to.

The Lone Walk

I had been walking for hours in the bush landscape
around where I live, teeming wildlife this year I even
caught the sight of a boar, she had had her brood with
her good, she didn’t see me. Tired I sat on a boulder
and lifted my feet off the ground, this was great, but
only for a while a stone was hard and my back began
to ache, so I got up and began walking towards home.

My wife had gone away for a few days but now my
aloneness was beginning to hurt; mind the first night
was great, bed all for myself, slept well and got up late
and ate what wasn’t good for me. It was darkening,
soon it will rain, May has been very wet this year, and
it began just as I reached the front door, only I had no
key; must have lost it when I sat on that stone.