That Was When We Knew

When April winds raised winter dust

in bomb battered London

they sang for joy,

though some were fatherless, iron

in their hearts, a chill alloy

that belled pure notes in Spring,

when sudden gusts shook dust from trees

drab Londoners changed their skins,

donned country airs    shelled new peas.

But where they sang none sing there now

St. James' choir    St. James' bell

both made redundant    silent now,

except my memory hears this knell

St. James' bell    St. James' bell

not named in London's rhymes

I'll not return to Camberwell

now St. James' bell no longer chimes.

There was a rope from the belfry

for tolling the bell   tolling the bell

a few would come to sing the hymns

a choir outnumbered them

whose own parents stayed at home 

where television was shown

an organist played full bore

the vicar’s hand that blessed them all

was maimed because of war

So, with a brain brim full of overspill

among some images preferred unseen

I see when weddings paid a choral fee

receptions were catered in the church hall

where Sheila was in the badminton club

who was good at games and grammar school

I delivered a newspaper to her house each day

kissing before placing it in the box.

Miriam moved among different strata

at the time when skiffle turned to rock

she lived on the corner of Flodden Road

where some soldiers once came marching with their flag 

and my father stopped holding my hand

while he stood to attention and removed his hat

he was once a Regular in that Regiment

that had barracks close by.

Miriam went to concerts on an island 

in the Thames where the Stones played

she was way ahead of me already free

not needing to study for a degree.

Her house was next to a bombsite

through cracks in the fence on Haslmere Road

you could see greenery flowers birds and bees

there were prefabs off Lothian Road

built on flat ground replacing houses

barrage balloons in Myatts Park 

had not kept bombs away.

My mother told of putting out incendiaries

in front of Calais Gate where they had scored

a roomy flat when he came home from war. 

He’d been blown up in North Africa 

then bombed again when he got home

minus an eye and with a gammy leg

That was when we knew what we were fighting for.

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                    2024