News Poem by Jean Bernard Parr

news of her death
makes big the clock
loud, the tick-tock
news that doesn't
come with hearty knock
but murmurs
in twos and threes
over garden wall
news, like a naughty dog
slips over the road
to make unravelled
his worry ball
and while the talk is
among her hollyhocks
there is now a space
in our pop-up book
the telephone rings, look
someone at the door?
the things are neat,
still, and waiting
in the kitchen drawer
and on a shelf, a torch
you cant get the batteries
anymore