First World Problems: Ten Miniatures for Anzac Day
I.
Cobblestones shine
from day-long downpour;
public holiday takes dreamy footsteps
through mid-week tension.
II.
The sun too shy to rise this morning,
yet rises late as rain
from the day slowly subsides.
At its going and rising, remember…
III.
Too early and cold this morning;
the Dawn Service dropped into
my conscience and sat there.
I pulled up my blanket and slept.
IV.
And the knowledge lingers:
peace bought with blood hangs
over the day, a red-stained cloud
to the holiday quiet.
V.
Cardigan-clad, cold
in unheated home,
rain outside, cleaning the streets
and dampening insides.
VI.
The knowledge of death
beneath, above, this quiet looms:
As darkness deepens,
Lord with me abide.
VII.
Battles fought remembered now,
though reasons for them elude us,
and the peace they brought us
sits lazily among us.
VIII.
Remember now the fallen, not
to glory in streets filled with blood,
or homes destroyed, but to know
of times of war not like this peace.
IX.
And remember, too, the blood
which fell from heaven.
Remember too the wars we wage
daily with our torpid souls.
VIII.
Forgive us, Lord, who sit
inside and cower
from a cold we do not dare
to face or feel.
The Consolations of Writing 
Only tell me this
When pregnant tombs give birth
That hope will smile again and
Mothers rest in peace.