Re-Building Today
© 2009,AndrewHull

Three bedrooms and a sleep-out with a single brick veneer
A weatherboard extension (nearly finished) at the rear
A line of ornamental pine on roughly mown lawn
An overgrown vegie patch and single peppercorn
To say the shed was watertight would simply be untrue
The ceiling leaked a bit as well, it’s on his list ‘to do’
Not perfect by a long shot, but nothing ever is
A man must have a castle and this castle was his
Now just a pile of ashes being slowly blown away
Twisted tin and broken frames
Photographs and family names
But houses can rise from the flames
He’s re-building today.

They hardly spent a day apart, a close-knit sort of crew
Not locals ‘born and bred but they weren’t ‘just passing through
She was known in town to be made of ‘the right stuff’
He worked around the local farms and that was good enough
The kids were wild and happy, not a care to call their own
For trouble had not touched them and worry was unknown
Not perfect, but she had hope for what they would become
So she lost more than others, still not as much as some
He’d seen them safely down the road and said that he would stay
But little did they comprehend
The loss of father, husband, friend
But families can also mend
She’s re-building today

Just a sleepy little town ‘somewhere down the line’
The thoroughfare had passed them by and that suited them fine
The corner store supplied their ‘needs’ because their ‘wants’ were few
And there was always something somewhere that they had to do
The faces were familiar when you passed them in the street
And those you didn’t know you knew you would be soon to meet
Not perfect, but it had found a place in many hearts
And towns like these were always more than just a sum of parts
Now just a row if chimney stacks amidst the disarray
But in those streets of ash and pain
There are those who still remain
Communities can grow again
They’re re-building today