by Ankh Spice
Ice
An afternoon tantrum of hail
follows rain’s deafening argument.
The Esplanade lies stunned white
under icebergs, unseasoned
and embarrassed by such public fury.
In their million-dollar
seafront houses, the occupants
are also embarrassed – rage-
weather reveals you
here in paradise – stormdrain rats unsecret
themselves. These once-sailor rodents are canny
to floods, a century and a half settled in
lessons to flee rising water – driven wet-
nest-rockets. But hail doesn’t happen here, not here
in the tropics we don’t like to think
about the ice; cold, pale, suddenly here. Glossied
by the brazen bruise-
light sky, missiled bodies lie fat in the street.
The ice-sheets, already melting,
will drift them home to dark tunnels,
so in the evening it’s an easy jog up the hill, nothing
on the road but the painted blue line
and the stylised wave, meaning
Tsunami-safe-zone. From the ridge, a stain
of roofshadow creeps the battered beach, longing
toward the drains. Come bullroarer wind
rolling memory on its tongue – pūrerehua shivers
the hairs, prickled cloud breathes out a clock
of moon, hands of light pulling up wave
after wave and she never stopped
ticking – one minute
you’re running with your kids
to higher ground. The next,
the sky will be falling.
Note: Pūrerehua is a traditional musical instrument (known in English as a bullroarer), in Māori culture associated with summoning rain.
Ankh Spice is a sea-obsessed, queer-identified poet from Aotearoa. His work has been widely published internationally, with several poems nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, and one chosen as a winner of the Poetry Archive’s WorldView 2020 competition. You’ll find him and a lot of sea photography on Twitter @SeaGoatScreams or on Facebook @AnkhSpiceSeaGoatScreamsPoetry.