Today

The seventeenth of April

One of those coincidental days

which sets up false connections,

statistics say don’t mean a thing.

But because the seventeenth of April

Was the day of my Dad’s birthday

I noticed and remembered it,

twice incised on a memorial stone

Effie born in eighteen ninety-one in Timaru

Died in childbirth, buried in Ymir

exactly twenty three years later,

The seventeenth of April

[this has been submitted to Jo Prescott, but is also relevant to today so I am including it here]

Presence not presents

Every birthday of a child

holds a memory of that first day.

for it’s mother

Today an echo of Matthew’s birth,

began early, at dawn.

His serious gaze

meeting mine, reassuring

before we were parted,

temporarily.

[This was finished too late to be included in Jo Prescott's challenge yesterday, when it would have been more appropriate]