Old Gideon

My 

class -

mates spent their summers watching Bewitched,

looking in the fridge, fighting with the sibs, 

scraping the tar from their soles.

For me its up at 6.30

catch the 7.30

to town

the bus to 

Newtown and 

Pacific Souvenirs

where I'd pour heady resins into moulds

for paua shell ashtrays, plastic 

dolphins, Maori girl dolls

where Old Gideon

the Pitcairn

Islander

with his hand

cupped to his only ear, would tell us how 

they built boats back there, spending 

months - years? - waiting for a 

piece of drift - wood the right 

shape to drift by -

where Stu,

in his Ugg boots would now and then faint 

from the toxic fumes. The windows 

wouldn't open, they were nailed 

shut. Where the dirt

floor with the 

12x1 path

would collect 

water 

when it 

Welly rained.

Where Graeme told me 'the old man turns

a three thousand dollar drum of resin

into thirty thousand dollars of 

plastic tikis, paua shell 

fruit trays, toilet

plaques'

(some come here to sit and think...) which

my mum, in their Manners Street shop

would sell to Deepfreeze sailors,

they'd come into the shop 

and ask 'is this a real 

Ma-ori doll?'

She almost married 

one of them, We would have moved to Traverse City,

Michigan - the state shaped like a mitten. I could 

have seen Iggy & The Stooges, I could've 

heard the MC5 - Suzy Quatro might 

have been my neighbour.

But. She. Didn't. Marry. Him. 

Hot Town, Summer in the City. Back of my Neck . . .

Rob Lamb 2012