Live Encounters Poetry & Writing Volume Three November-December 2024
Aotearoa Poets and Writers Special Edition
Two Poems by Alexandra Fraser.
A Rhipidura fuliginosa
good enough just as it is
Let the fantail be just a bird
a thing of bones and feathers
striving for a mate a nest food
for its young
don’t require it
to bear the burden
of a human soul so that you
can feel watched over
connected to your lost
let the bird be only a bird
good enough just as it is seizing
insects from the air that you
have disturbed as you pass
remembering your grandmother
Every day I love someone new
I loved the taxi driver for 25 minutes today He said my daughter works for a big finance firm you will know it very famous He said the name I didn’t but yes I said well done her He said the prime minister of India is bad such bad things in my country He said there is my house pointing as we travel down Great North Road
For four and a half hours I love the young Polish woman who packed up my kitchen She said we like to take very good care She said all your glasses I will wrap like this Be careful when you undo She said this beach is great for my kids they love it here I make sure they are bilingual I say dziękuję which I had just googled
I loved the arborist for a whole day Right he said Good he said That’ll do it as he swung from a high branch then switched on his chainsaw He said do you want the manuka for firewood?
Later I ask how was school today? learn anything new? You teenage-grunt me You politely adjust your earbud try not to let your eyes return to your screen
Every day I love someone new Every day I love you again and again
© Alexandra Fraser
Alexandra Fraser lives in the west of the beautiful Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, surrounded by kauri and tree-fern. She has been published in magazines and anthologies in Aotearoa and internationally, and has been highly placed in many poetry competitions. Alexandra is a member of the Isthmus creative and critique group of poets, whom she met while completing the Master Creative Writing at AUT. She’s published two poetry collections through Steele Roberts Conversation by Owl-Light (2014), Star Trails (2019), and is working on two more – one on history and ecology, the other on networks.