We’re All Here Buried

Alive under fifteen feet of pure white snow,
my plan for survival is to slowly eat my floral cotton dress.
I will do it remembering summer and the heady days
of edible garden flowers when everyone was mad
for poached pears and crumbled Stilton;
when it was the thing to bring the most expensive savvy and call it plonk.
Everything pre-earthquake, everyone walking on tip-toes
over the rumpled rug of our own fault
lines. The wee earnest man from St John’s
did a number on my sister — she forked out
hundreds for a survival kit
with free plastic carry case,
tablets that promised to turn the future putrid waters
into evian, dried biscuits that would feed the army
and a silver jacket that if nothing else, would prove
to the others who’s boss.
Letters are bunging up the letter box.
No one has taken down their Christmas lights.
The aborted pine browns to rust
in the backyard, embarrassed to be so dead.