Visiting Worser Bay School on Sunday Morning

Honeysuckle, taupata, rangiora, briar rose,
the usual Wellington tangle spreading over
the usual hill, steep to the sea; behind me

the school in its soughing pines - and pohutukawas
which also sing to the wind, but not with the aching cry
of the pines. All as it was. Forty years since I

bustled about (I suppose that's what I did)
in these hilltop classrooms, while the amiable
...