Mr Tait

Posted on August 6, 2022 by beeblu

As I ride pillion through this primeval forest, I don’t think
of the ancient trees, how they give us the smooth paper leaves
on which we love to press down with granite
made from the centre of the earth;
nor of the fungi beneath, how one fruiting body brings us certain death
and another alters our consciousness
with its saprotrophic strangeness;
nor of the native bees, how their furry-bodied industries
sustain our food security and survival
as a species;

but instead

of Mr Tait, whose smile
was a warning, and how he taught
us to bookmark a book with its own pages
without damage, and how he showed us how to mitigate
injury from possible falls when using a chair
as a ladder, and how he use to call
all the boys Fathead!

©️2020 K Price

Weekly Photo Challenge: Gone, But Not Forgotten

Posted on December 6, 2014 by beeblu

My maternal grandfather had many interests and hobbies: he studied the stars (astronomically, as opposed to astrologically), played the violin and loved photography, carrying his camera wherever he went.

I don’t know if he kept a journal, but if he did, it’s long lost; however, his insatiable curiosity about so many things–from people to architecture, to history, to nature–is well documented through the many photos (in slide form) that he took over his lifetime.

He worked as a mosaic tradesman and sometimes travelled from his hometown, Durban, South Africa, by ship up the east coast of Africa to do mosaic work on buildings in exotic places, such as Lourenço Marques (now Maputo) and Beira.

On one of these trips, he took my mum and brother along, documenting the journey with his lens.

I particularly love this photo that he took on the ship of my mum making bubbles for my brother. And I love my mum’s reaction to it: “Oh, what a silly young thing I was then.”

Photo by RIP © beeblu

For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post.

Lena Maree

Posted on April 16, 2014 by beeblu

Tonight,
I think of my maternal grandmother,
(Chelsea buns, vetkoek, hugs to save the world)
passed some 30-odd years ago –
“Kari, Kari…”, her loving voice as I drift to sleep
and remember that stark day
she fell crossing the road
outside the Durban Museum

And I, five, thinking she was dead,
screamed!

But she did not let go
of my hand, and smiled
in her usual, generous way
as strangers helped her to her feet.

Always the comforter of souls –
Sweet, wonderful Lena Maree.

Weekend Prompt: Childhood Revisited

Posted on December 9, 2012 by beeblu

It wasn’t smells or tastes or dear old Patchy,
or Teddy or Polly or clothes that were scratchy,

but bright orange blossoms beaming out from my walls,
retro symbols of happiness from ceiling to floor –
my first bedroom’s wallpaper sticks like glue
in my mind to this day (my sibling’s too –
at the time they thought he had chronic colic
but, it seems, brother’s wall-art was making him sick –
all those racing-cars whizzing about his head
(he confessed, years later) made him dizzy in bed).

So my first memory – wallpaper, and subtropical heat,
and the tickles of mum’s kisses under my feet.

In response to the Daily Post’s Weekend Prompt: Childhood Revisited – What is your earliest memory? Describe it in detail, and tell us why you think that experience was the one to stick with you.