It was always fun staying at the bach with the bunks.
And one big bro fell from off the top.
Pipi fritters and chocolate bomb ice creams
from the shop with wooden floors
across from where the pine trees littered the cool sand
with their needles.
But the adults were inscrutable.
First there was the butcher
who turned naughty children into sausages.
And once collecting driftwood for the fire our pile was huge.
And me at four years old left to guard it. Who were the women
who eyed me up and took the lot? Surely they must have known?
And when Aunty Peggy tripped and fell
her knee bloodied
with bits of gravel all over
it seemed to me to have been cleaved – right – off.
Why did no one explain?
(c) Helen McKinlay
This poem is from my childhood…memories of a a beach holiday at Waikanae. The images have always been with me.
NB Pipis are a New Zealand shellfish. They make wonderful fritters! Yum. Chocolate bombs were a tall oblong ice cream in a cone. A bach in those days was a small very simple beach cottage.
Please return to Tuesday Poem here where Helen Lowe is this week’s Hub editor with a poem from one of our own Tuesday poets …Eileen Moeller from America.
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