Category: 2010

HINEMOANA BAKER   Ko Whitireia te maunga Ko Porirua te moana Ko Ngāti Toa te iwi Ko Whitireia te Kura Matatini Nau mai, haere mai, hoki mai – a warm welcome to 4th Floor Literary Journal2010. I am delighted to once again be invited to bring together writing from the…

Love in the Fifties She wore a second-hand, button-through frock covered in rosebuds a belt at her waist of the same fabric and black patent shoes he wore corduroy trousers a silver cigarette tin in his back pocket and carpet slippers they paid half a crown at the turnstile and…

Smiley Face The teenagers sitting in front of me draw funny, smiley faces on the train-seat upholstery with their felt-tip pens, and snap photos of each other doing naughty things. You’re mean to me, and so I’ll be mean back, they tell each other. The train crosses the water, and…

Intercity First gear, clutch, reverse. A dirty rear window. It is my dream about being able to drive. In real life there are so many people boarding the long-distance bus, a pause for the woman in the wheelchair. The bus driver presses a button and the stairs transmogrify into a…

Doggie Bones A new year means nothing to a dog. Sometimes these days I get money and time confused, this is a dollar and this is an hour, I have to re-educate myself. A new bone means more to a dog than a new year, and a new year means…

Tongueprints for Great Grandma Catherine and her mother Mary Ultima Thule: a glimpse of Muckle Flugga and a kinswoman’s welcome. Tresta, Trondra, Northmavine Fetlar, Uyeasound, Gutcher, Yell Sullum Voe, Girlsta, Mousa, Unst. One-way roads wi passin bays: on da scattald, hedder’s flooerin. Peerie, plantiecrub, tushkar, trow, dulskit, etterskab, fogrie, haaf,…

The moment of joining After a long day of driving past empty dairy factories and small towns with family associations, he chose a tree for his mother; a European tree he didn’t know the name of, but felt she would have liked. Thinking of her ashes as containing trace elements…

The door Every morning something is on the doorstep – a cat, a flower, a bottle of milk. Last night there was a wind that violently swept the street but respectfully left the step undisturbed. A small oasis. A still life. A bicycle is coming down the street. The bell…

Loving our kids I’d wrap my arms around you and sing in your ear a song about a frog dancing in a pool. I’d play my guitar to you, my fingers small frogs dancing on the strings, the strings become the legs of a cicada strumming against a brown shell…

Lost in translation He has learnt the word in English. Rabbit. He points at the book, says in his thick accent, ‘Rabbit.’ It is freezing cold. There is frost on the window. ‘Rabbit’ comes out in a cloud of smoke. ‘No,’ she says. ‘It’s not a rabbit.’ She points at…