Our Christchurch – after the earthquake*

Along Bealey Avenue
we skipped to school
catching the falling
chestnut leaves.

We knew as children always
do the fairy folk rule
that each one caught
meant one whole happy day!

Such a present keenly sought
for a weary mother
or tired Dad, to say
just for you, no other,
see what I have brought!

Then winter and the heel’s crack
splitting the puddle’s ice star-bright,
the frozen mittened hands. See back
to those haloed streetlights

whi…

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