\n.<\/span>
\n<\/em><\/p>\n
Since they widened the road,<\/p>\n
the house every night<\/p>\n
takes a deep breath,<\/p>\n
holds it and swells its walls<\/p>\n
suitably enlarged<\/p>\n
\u2026\u2026\u2026…..<\/span>under lamplight<\/p>\n as it edges onto the pavement.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Warns the stray dog not to dawdle<\/p>\n against its bright bedroom wall,<\/p>\n tells after-dark strollers<\/p>\n to cross the road<\/p>\n and settles into its alter ego,<\/p>\n preens a little, shakes out<\/p>\n its cream-painted skirting.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n They say, in the town,<\/p>\n a strange lady-writer<\/p>\n once lived alone in its<\/p>\n \u2026\u2026\u2026…..<\/span>shadowy sadness.<\/p>\n As the twin chimneys reach up<\/p>\n windslapped from the harbour,<\/p>\n fingers of light define<\/p>\n \u2026\u2026\u2026…..<\/span>roofs and walls,<\/p>\n pointing to a strange star hanging<\/p>\n unnamed over the Bridle Path. \u00a9 Lorna Staveley Anker, 1914 \u2013 2000<\/p>\n From The Judas Tree<\/strong>, edited by Bernadette Hall, Canterbury University Press, 2013<\/p>\n Reproduced here with permission<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n I just really like this poem, especially the way it speaks to Lyttelton-that-was — before the earthquakes which took quite a toll on this charming, steep-hilled, harbour & port-side town. Even without that though, I love the way the poem is embued with sense of place and the house has its own personality.\u00a0 As for that “strange lady-writer” I hope it’s her star that shines above the Bridal Path, then and now… \u201cLORNA STAVELEY ANKER was born in 1914. She used to joke that this was the cause of the First World War. In truth, the poems in this fine collection reveal her as New Zealand\u2019s first woman war poet. There are poems here that arise from her childhood memories of Kaiser Bill. Three of her uncles died in France.<\/em><\/p>\n She was a \u2018war widow\u2019 in the Second World War, one of the civilian casualties who make up what is known as \u2018the unsung generation\u2019\u201d<\/em> \u2014 from The Judas Tree<\/strong><\/p>\n Staveley Anker began her involvement with poetry in her fifties. \u2026 During her lifetime three books were published, two by her family and one through McBrearty and Associates, and her work was included in anthologies, including war anthologies and Canterbury-based publications.\u201d<\/em> \u2014 from Landfall <\/a>Review<\/a> Online,<\/a> review by Mary Macpherson<\/a>.<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n Bedroom on the Pavement Lyttelton . Since they widened the road, the house every night takes a deep breath, holds it and swells its walls suitably enlarged \u2026\u2026\u2026…..under lamplight as it edges onto the pavement. Warns the stray dog not to dawdle against its bright bedroom wall, tells after-dark strollers to cross the road […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22661"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22685,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22661\/revisions\/22685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n.<\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/judas_tree-200x300.jpg\" "\\"judas_tree\\"")
<\/a>About The Poem:<\/h3>\n
\n.<\/span><\/p>\nAbout The Poet:<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/08\/TuesPoem.jpg\" "\\"TuesPoem\\"")
<\/a>To read the featured poem on the Tuesday Poem Hub<\/strong> and other great poems from fellow Tuesday poets from around the world, click here<\/strong><\/a> or on the Quill<\/strong> icon <\/strong>in the sidebar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"