Ancestry

Ned and Helen

Ned                            Helen
the man.                      the woman.

Leaving Newcastle in 1860.
Tears on the dock.
Leaving  home and all you know.
Going somewhere so far away.
Torn.
Sailing ship
tossing on the endless ocean.
Down through the Doldrums
into the Roaring Forties.
Dunedin and the promise of gold in Otago.
Walking or wagon or horse.
Tracks maybe but no roads then.
Big lakes, unforgiving rivers.
Mountains to climb.
Women give birth in a calico tent
in a Macetown Southern hemisphere winter.
House of rock or timber
but ... not much in the way of firewood.
Men working the quartz mines for the
elusive gold
mixing mercury.
Hard times
tough folk
resilient
stoic.
Ancestors