My name echoes across playground,

it comes, it demands my attention.

I have to find out who calls,

who wants me for what.

My name gets blurted out in class,

it is a terror, at a bad time,

because somebody is cross.

My name gets called in a whisper

I am happy, because

my name may have touched me

with a loving voice.

Isn’t it all magic?

James Berry

Keeping Wicket

Keeping Wicket

When they were young,

She kept wicket for her brothers,

They batted,

Bowled,

Padded up

And ratcheted up the score.

She crouched behind the stumps

Keeping wicket.

She would have loved to bowl,

Just once to flick her wrist and watch the ball

Fly from her fingers, arcing through the air,

To hear the thwack of

Rubber on bamboo.

To not worry that the batsman might miss,

Or worse still get an edge.

She would have liked to bat,

To feel the jerk of willow in her hands

And watch the leather careering

Towards the boundary,

But she was too valuable a player,

To be put in to bat.

She had the best job, they said.

The wicket-keeper held the destiny of the team

In those thin gloves.

The wicket-keeper was the team’s protector.

A V.I.P.

So she crouched behind the stumps

Keeping wicket.

And when their mother developed

Into childhood,

Their diabetic father became an amputee,

They gave her the best job once again.

Her brothers were all busy at the crease,

So she crouched behind the stumps,

Keeping wicket.

She contemplated trying another game,

Was attracted to another life,

But though cricket is a man’s game,

No man it seems wants a wicket-keeper for a wife.

And when her parents passed,

She still played the game,

This time with nieces and nephews at the crease,

She had the best job once again,

Standing behind the stumps,

Keeping wicket.

Valerie Bloom

My Sister

My Sister

My sister’s remarkably light,

She can float to a fabulous height.

It’s a troublesome thing,

But we tie her with string,

And we use her instead of a kite.

Margaret Mahy

Middle Child

Middle Child

The piggy in the middle

The land between sky and sea

The cheese which fills the sandwich

The odd one out of three

The one who gets the hand-me-downs

And broken bits of junk

The follower, not the leader

The one in the bottom bunk

The one for whom the pressure’s off

The one who can run wild

The one who holds the balance of power

The lucky second child.

Lindsay MacRae

Siblings

Siblings

Like the Three Musketeers

we were all for one.

Like the Three Blind Mice

we saw without looking.

Like the Three Bowls of Porridge

we were just right.

Like the Three Sisters

we were sad inside.

Like the Three Billy Goats Gruff

we feared the troll.

Like the Three Little Pigs

we longed for our own home.

Like the Three Wishes