My car's just died.
As it splutters to a halt,
I seize the chance to explore.
I emerge, the heat
Engulfing me as I open the door.
My tanned face a dark brown
As it cakes in the summer sun.
Lighting a cigarette,
I can feel the white shirt I'm wearing
Glued to my back.
I reach for my comb, running it
Frantically through my locks.
I advance further, cigarette
Dangling from mouth.
I remembered my water bottle,
Recently filled,
Hung around my neck.
I walk nonchalantly through
The barren landscape,
Looking back at the car,
The driver's door wide open.
My boots challenged by
Craggy textures underfoot.
Ancient rock face in the distance,
Its remnants either side of me.
I just make out the boundaries of my father's
Childhood home. I can see
Bones of walls where the lounge used to be.
I remember my father sitting in his chair.
Reading his paper, smoking his pipe.
I now come to my old school,.
Markings of desks in my classroom,
The blackboard, teacher's cane in hand.
What memories.
I see the public house where I drank
For the very first time.
I sense the sound of the factory bell
Where I used to work, that also
Reduced to nothing.
I savour the look on my first wife's face
As we married in that old house I grew up in.
Why did we have to change?
I do not know what has happened to us.
I head back to the car,
Using some water from my bottle
For the radiator.
It starts again and I head home,
But I'll never forget my lost city.
(c) NZ 2009.

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