{"id":28852,"date":"2015-04-25T06:30:08","date_gmt":"2015-04-24T18:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=28852"},"modified":"2015-04-23T21:18:54","modified_gmt":"2015-04-23T09:18:54","slug":"anzac-day-centennary-nzef-trooper-203453-by-leigh-vickridge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2015\/04\/25\/anzac-day-centennary-nzef-trooper-203453-by-leigh-vickridge\/","title":{"rendered":"ANZAC Day Centennary: NZEF Trooper 203453 by Leigh Vickridge"},"content":{"rendered":"

NZEF Trooper 203453<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was born at Longton Avenue
\nin London
\nnot far from Crystal Palace<\/p>\n

High tea on Sunday evenings
\nwith the mater and the pater
\nthen minor public school<\/p>\n

Gallipoli washed away all that \u2013
\ncarnage at Chunuk Bair
\nflyblown corpses in the sun<\/p>\n

His number was not up:
\na shrapnel wound and fever
\nsaved his life<\/p>\n

Rehabilitation came
\nland impossible to farm
\nnear the Bridge to Nowhere<\/p>\n

The Depression brought ruin
\ntoo old to fight
\nin a second war<\/p>\n

Crumbling health
\nmemories of friends
\nlong dead<\/p>\n

His ashes cast
\non the cleansing waters
\nof a mountain stream<\/p>\n

In Aotearoa
\non Taranaki Mountain
\nnot far from Dawson\u2019s Falls
\n.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a9 Leigh Vickridge, 2008<\/p>\n

Published in The Christchurch Press<\/strong><\/em>, 23 April 2008<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

April 25 is ANZAC Day\u2014ANZAC standing for the Australia New Zealand Army Corps\u2014and today marks the hundredth anniversary of the ANZAC landing at Gallipoli:<\/p>\n

“Gallipoli washed away all that \u2013<\/em>
\n carnage at Chunuk Bair<\/em>
\n flyblown corpses in the sun”<\/em><\/p>\n

I first posted this poem in 2011<\/a>, but re-post it again today, both because it addresses the Gallipoli experience, but also, as I said in 2011: “The poem has an elegaic quality that I always feel \u201cspeaks\u201d quite profoundly to the ANZAC experience.”<\/em><\/p>\n

To read other poems that speak to the ANZAC experience, click on:<\/p>\n

Ellen\u2019s Vigil<\/a> by Lorna Staveley Anker<\/h4>\n

Ellen\u2019s Vigil<\/em><\/strong> is inscribed in NZ\u2019s national memorial to the Unknown Soldier. I featured it as part of my 2013 war poetry series:<\/p>\n

\u201cBenjamin\u2026\u2026..<\/span>Isaac\u2026\u2026.<\/span>Tom<\/em>
\n Passchendaele\u2026..<\/span>Ypres\u2026<\/span>and Somme<\/em>
\n \u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026.<\/span>three ovals float<\/em>
\n \u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026.<\/span>on the cold wall<\/em>
\n plastered whiter<\/em>
\n \u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026..<\/span>than their bones\u2026\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Also:<\/p>\n

Lijssenthoek<\/strong><\/a> by Joanna Preston<\/h4>\n
\u201cthe fields of flanders \u2013<\/div>\n
\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 the rich red<\/div>\n
\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 of the cemetery gates
\n.<\/span>
\nThere. Red brick and white stone; an archway anything but triumphal. We wheeled our hired bicycles through the gate-building, blinking at the transition from light to shadow to light again as we stepped out into the garden. And garden it was. Rows of lilies, ranged in front of the crosses that marked the Canadian graves. The New Zealand graves. The South African graves\u2026\u201d<\/em><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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 \u2013 carnage at Chunuk Bair flyblown corpses in the sun His number was not up: a shrapnel wound and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28852","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=28852"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28855,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28852\/revisions\/28855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}