Tuesday Poem: NZEF Trooper 203453 by Leigh Vickridge
NZEF Trooper 203453
He was born at Longton Avenue
in London
not far from Crystal Palace
High tea on Sunday evenings
with the mater and the pater
then minor public school
Gallipoli washed away all that –
carnage at Chunuk Bair
flyblown corpses in the sun
His number was not up:
a shrapnel wound and fever
saved his life
Rehabilitation came
land impossible to farm
near the Bridge to Nowhere
The Depression brought ruin
too old to fight
in a second war
Crumbling health
memories of friends
long dead
His ashes cast
on the cleansing waters
of a mountain stream
In Aotearoa
on Taranaki Mountain
not far from Dawson’s Falls
.
© Leigh Vickridge, 2008
Published in The Christchurch Press, 23 April 2008
—
April 25 is ANZAC Day—ANZAC standing for the Australia New Zealand Army Corps—and primarily commemorates the participation of New Zealand service men and women in the First and Second World Wars.
This poem was written by Leigh Vickridge, the father of one of my school friends, in commemoration of his father who served in the NZ Expeditionary Force in World War 1. The poem has an elegaic quality that I always feel “speaks” quite profoundly to the ANZAC experience. I submitted the poem to The Christchurch Press on Leigh’s behalf, but sadly he himself passed away shortly before it was published on 23 April 2008. I reproduce it here today for ANZAC Day, but also in memory of both Leigh and his father, the latter whom I knew only—schoolgirl fashion—as “Old Mr Vickridge.”
I just love this poem, well done you for recognising it and bringing it out into the sun.
It’s great, isn’t it? Almost the perfect ANZAC poem.
First words that come to mind when I read this was lest we forget, its very poignant (hope that was the right word I was thinking of I’m not a writer but a reader).
I think “poignant” is exactly the right word.:)