By Rachel Fenton
The Healing Garden
The healing garden is a circle within circles – raised flower beds surround a sculpture from the Rotary Club, gears worn smooth, a clockwork cog. An apology walks on two legs between the unturned earth; our PM lays out peach for the dead. Among all that is senseless, feathers suspended in webs resemble hammocks for the imagination to rest.
People Who Walk Parks by Day
Alone, wear gloves and heavy clothing, look away when people who walk parks by day pull carts, say Hullo, trying to appear youthful and appear youthful by accident because they have their hood pulled up by the parent they carry zipped inside of them. There is an abundance of unnatural orange.
Pushing the Pram
See me on the bench, point in passing, say, That’s the life. Aren’t you lucky *assume baby voice* to have such a wonderful mummy who takes you to the park; You’re doing a great job, honey. Don’t give up your seat; make a lot of noise.
Rachel J Fenton is a working-class poet living in Aotearoa New Zealand. Her chapbook Beerstorming with Charlotte Bronte in New York is forthcoming from Ethel Press in 2021.
Academy of the Heart And Mind 