A Tingling Catch contributor Cyril Childs dies

Sadly, another contributor to A Tingling Catch passed away in January this year.

Cyril Childs (1941-2012) was a cricketer, scientist, leading haiku poet and editor of national haiku anthologies in New Zealand.

Childs had a keen interest in sports such as rugby and cricket and in 2010 I was in touch with him to use his cricket haiku for A Tingling Catch.

I wrote on Childs’ cricket haiku for this blog. Childs also contributed a Second World War cricket poem to this blog by Jack Gallichan (brother of New Zealand cricketer Norm Gallichan).

Childs, himself a promising cricketer, played as a right-hand batsman and leg break bowler for Otago Under 20s in 1960/61 in the Brabin Tournament and in 1961/62 in the Rothman’s U23 tournament as well as representing Southland against Fiji at Queen’s Park, Invercargill, that same season. (The Cricket Archive in England has a player page for Cyril.)

Childs was living in Dunedin at the time of his death.

I’d like to offer my condolences to Cyril’s friends and family at this time.

Here is Cyril’s ‘Cricket Song III’ from A Tingling Catch in memory of him:

CYRIL CHILDS

Cricket song III

out-swinger

    nicks a thigh-pad –

    the umpire’s finger

wobbles

french cut for 4 –

    the new batsman hastens

    to adjust his pads

close of play –

    shadows of trees

    seep over the pitch

Poem © Cyril Childs

(From A Tingling Catch: A Century of New Zealand Cricket Poems 1864-2009 edited by Mark Pirie [Wellington: HeadworX, 2010])

Cyril Childs (1941-2012)