Life is a Grocery Store by Laurice Gilbert

My father was a general manager,

stock-controller, check-out man –

a holistic server of people’s needs.

My mother cut cheese, bagged flour,

and weighed onions –

maintenance tasks out the back.

Sometimes Mum filled in at the counter,

protecting the till while Dad

made weekly deliveries.

                                    The Grocer had a car.

In Newtown everyone knew

everyone else – and their business:

“The Grocers have another daughter”

            (The Queen has had another son).

Feelings were kept on the top shelf

where children couldn’t reach them.

Published in the whole wide world ed. Vivienne Jepson (The NZ Poetry Society, Wgtn, 2000.)

Are We There Yet? by Laurice Gilbert

when we get there

there will be bright lights, loud sounds,

a midwife, murmurs and smiles

when we get there

there will be balloons, loot bags,

ice-cream, pizza and games

when we get there

there will be grades, exams,

music, drama and life-long friends

when we get there

there will be speeches, jokes,

feasting, toasting and fruit cake

when we get there

there will be showers, gifts,

long nights, nappies and tantrums

when we get there

there will be car pools, concerts,

sports days, meetings and reports

when we get there

there will be late nights, phone bills

old cars, dating and tears

when we get there

they will be flatting, landing new jobs,

marrying, going on their OE, and fears

when we get there

there will be gardening, bowls,

grandchildren, hospitals and funerals

when we get there                                                                                         

there will be flowers, cards,

eulogies, caskets and asparagus rolls                                            

                                                                                                                    

when we get there   

Published in Bravado 19, July 2010

Exactly fair by Charmaine Thomson

In this fugitive house of boxes

we are unpacking a betrayal

Some appliances, but not enough

to furnish a basement

you missed the car warrant,

too involved in grieving

and legal manoeuvring

with frost on your throat

Let us have a day of non events

just to be equitable,  

It is exactly this,

a payment for decamping.

 

Night Shift By Asa Boxer

The owl skirrs for mouse
and in his gut, he turns her
inside-out. The bat weaves

through the criss-cross trees,

wings upon her sonar pings
to trap the bug and feel him sing.

Owl, wise anatomist, studies

the tissues, then spits the gist:
the shag and bone of what exists.

And bat, dread acrobat, flips

the forest upside-down, and all
the creatures underground,

the shrew, the hedgehog and the mole

fall out like rattled soldiers
from their tunnelled holes.

The Sisters of Murphy by Asa Boxer

When I’d no juice left, already cried uncle,

at rock bottom, looking for comfort;

one loosened upon me her furious craw

of indigestibles, another arrested me with guilt.

One, laser-eyed, hurled an ashtray

full of ashes flicked through a night of waiting-up,

while another re-enacted, in voices and postures,

a play to catch the conscience of the king.

If you’re sedentary, loyal as a dog. If you must

stay where you’re unwanted, a family man…

these Sisters will make a raging sibling of you,

and Brother with Sister, conceive Monsters

of Murphy that bring alive the broomstickand

hobby-horses of your cowboys-’n-indians.

It’ll take the nurse, the nanny and the marm,

those generals of the schoolyard theatre, to disarm

your horse-play. They’ll tell you that, however dressed,

sticks are not horses, hearts are not wood.

They’ll grumble that Murphy tied the blindfold on Love.

Attend to the broomsticks. Attend to each room.

The Sisters of Murphy will be visiting soon.

The Penitent Ring by Charmaine Thomson

Ne

me

quitte

pas, he sings

feeding the breadstick

To the young woman opposite

Wasting time with father time, mesmerized by his hands

The bared throat and sling backs say, I don’t mind, you are still young at heart.

At the next table it’s all about the marina

with vain traces of a lush life.

But it is too late

For this dress

and this

gold

ring.

Equilibrium by Charmaine Thomson

I

can’t

find it

anywhere.

Equilibrium:

completely annihilated

The sinful wreckage of wardrobe survivors burning

Colliding in three dimensions

Beating gravity

Holding back

until

it

stops