Today's SNAP poem

There is a man peering down a hole in China. The man is bent over, very intent on staring down the hole where dark shadows mask almost everything. Fireworks rattle sparrows from the trees. The hole is a very square hole, a manhole in a courtyard where a building is under construction among other buildings. It is a tight fit. Perhaps the hole travels clear to the other side of the world and sunlight is a mere pinprick in the far distance. Fizz, bang and crackle of fireworks stops as suddenly as it began. The bad spirits have all run away. In a corner of the courtyard, beside the wide trunk of an old oak tree, a young woman raises her voice at the young man beside her – raises her voice to tell him how she sees it. He hangs his head and wishes he was somewhere other than where he is. Fireworks explode again. As a child I was somewhere else – on the west coast of Australia. And I dug such a hole. Round. I dug and I dug and my brother said, 'You'll reach China soon if you keep digging!', so I kept digging. My mother raised her voice and I hung my head, wishing I was somewhere else. Now I am in China watching a man staring down a hole at a small boy's freckled face sweating as he digs in the sunshine. Suddenly he looks up - fireworks!