Paper on the Wind

I waited
Keeping each dagger-slash hidden away
Hidden away for sanity’s sake.
In time I grew strong.
Today, I took out each piece of scarred tissue
Laid them on the table
Studied them
Pieced them together
And walked away.

Jan Bridle

Ourselves and our Writing

We are a group of women from 20-64 years who meet to write, talk about our writing and work on it together. Some of us had never written before. Others had never shown anyone else their work. For all of us it was important to take the first public step with other women, to be taken seriously without the kinds of crit¬icism which destroy new and fragile confidence. We want to work hard at our writing, and make it better without feeling put down by other people’s standards. This is our first book. These are not all ‘finished’ pieces. Some have been quickly written in the few spare minutes of a working day. Others have been worked and re-worked in and outside the group, right up to the last minute. The book is part of our process of becoming writers, of seeing ourselves as writers. More about ourselves and our group below:

Sadie Abbiss

I am a 62 year old housewife, rather a reluctant one I’m afraid. Born and brought up in Tipton, a Black Country town in Staffordshire, I left school with. Patric when I’ was just 16 years of age. After a tentative start at book-keeping I went into Domestic Service when my Grandma, who brought me up from the age of 3, had to go into hospital. I did war service in the Land Army, but prior to that had jobs as semi-companion domestic help, house-parlourmaid, and cook-general. I have also worked as heavy driver for the RAF, milk roundswoman, tractor driver on a pig farm, waitress at Torquay, telephonist on the Mayflower Exchange, wholesale bread roundswoman and shorthand typist. I have one daughter, aged 26.

It was a chance announcement on a Radio Sussex prog¬ramme. It was the voices of Ursula, then Janis, urging me to join the ranks of the proletarian writing women of QueenSpark, which organisation was spawning a new Group for Women Only. What’s more it was Free, Free, Free. No hassle at home as to the financial aspect of the New Venture. So I was all set for the ten o’clock Take Off on a certain Tuesday in March 1984. I managed to locate 12 Hanover Crescent and lurked outside a while before entering. Inside I encountered two people I had seen hovering outside. They were Jean and Maureen and we ascended to the first floor and entered a rather pleasant airy room at the front of the house. The memories of subsequent meetings have overlaid my impression of that first gathering, but we always felt welcomed and encouraged. The early meetings were loosely structured around our mid-meeting coffee (do we always remember to pay?).

Recently our meetings have been reorganised, so that the first half-hour is spent in general chat, then coffee, and an appointed speaker guides the reading and discussion of writing by one or two different members each week. Sometimes there is not sufficient time to complete the reading and discussion, so it has to be carried over to the following week. Sometimes in times of Crisis or impending events requiring immediate attention this agreed format may be abandoned temporarily. If we can manage it, we like to have a Quiet Period of 10-15 minutes in which perhaps to ob¬tain the soothing influence and spiritual renewal of SILENCE or, if we are fortunate, to obtain INSPIRATION!

Julie MacAlpine

I was born in Patcham, Brighton, where I lived with my mother, uncle and grandparents. My grandfather was a viola player and was the father of Paul Beard, the violinist. My uncle John also played in the BBC Symphony Orchestra. When I was seven, my father died and I went to live in Wolverhampton. Afterwards I moved to London. I am divorced and the mother of twin daughters, aged 17. As well as the writers’ group, I belong to a Poetry Circle and I am studying poetry and the history of art through evening classes at Friends Centre, Brighton.

Olive Masterson

I was born in Brighton in 1920. I left school at 14 with nothing – except accolades in swimming! The next day I went to work, at Cox’s Pill Factory. That job lasted 10 months. Then I worked as a blousemaker, private dressmaker and, during the war, as a uniform-maker. Later I worked as a children’s nurse, which had always been my ambition. I was married in 1942, had 5 children including twins, and spent the last 20 years of my working life looking after other people’s children in the canteen at the university – as tea-lady and friend. My husband died in 1978 and I’m now trying to make a new life for myself. So at 63 I began to write. It gives me a wonderful opport¬unity to express my feelings and has enabled me to come to terms with life. I look forward to each Tuesday to see my friends and work with them.

Margaret Bearfield

I was born fifty years ago, at No. 48 Cavendish Street, the youngest in a family of fourteen. Five had died before my birth. I have two married daughters and am a grandmother. I have always lived around the area near to where I was born, and I have seen many changes. Most, for the good. I love Brighton and its people and never get bored with any part of it.

Writing for me is almost spiritual. A sense of free¬dom that opens my mind. It has given me an identity. I find the strength of the pen a great help when I feel weak. I think simplicity appeals more than anything else in writing. I like to read – and understand. After all, not everyone in the world is intellectual. I like to write to please the common people. When I write with emotion, I feel I’ve shed a heavy load. Writing is soothing to me. I write for the pleasure it gives – and because I feel I must. Writing is me, feeling free.

Jo Stevenson

Words, words, tumble, jumble
Leaping in my mind.
Inspiring, firing, conspiring,
All to send me mad with
Trying to catch them just
To tie them on the page
Before they’ve slipped away.

Having been married, divorced and remarried; had four children and acquired two more, I have proved either amazing optimism or lunacy – or both. Most of my emotion is expended on my children, who range in age from fourteen to three years. They run me ragged, strip me to the bone; take me to the edge; then haul me back in again with just a word and a hug. If my husband wasn’t so great, I think I would take to the drink – and my bed.

Writing has always been part of me, like my stubby fingers or my dark unruly curling Irish hair! All my life I struggled for approval both of myself and my words. When I joined the group with all their understanding and kindness I suddenly found all the approv¬al I needed. Since then, I have had several of my poems and stories published and have been somewhat taken aback at both the overwhelmingly positive rec¬eption they get from women and the violently negative reaction of quite a few men! It was quite a shock to find that my words can touch people so closely. In fact, for the last couple of months I haven’t written at all, as I needed to take a step back to see where my writing is going. Now I’ve started again, on something totally different, a book about being a stepmother – not a pleasant thing to be. I shall let my more feminist poems lie for a while – until the urge strikes again.

Pepper Moth

My father was a German p.o.w. and my mother was Welsh. I was born in Llandrindod Wells, a Welsh Spa town, and brought up in Radnorshire, which is now Powys. At the age of 6 we moved to a small town called Kington on the Herefordshire/Welsh border. I left home at 19 and moved south to Tunbridge Wells and married a few years later. I have a son, Simon, who is now 12 years old. I have been fortunate to be able to travel the world and meet people from all walks of life. I indulge in photography and writing poetry. I also have a flair for painting and sketching and have enjoyed helping with the illustrations for this book.

Our group of women writers congregate once a week for a couple of hours. We help and inspire each other with our work. Some are lucky, they can produce ‘works of art’ which make very good listening. We are all open to criticism and praise when it’s due.

You don’t have to be a mastermind to become a writer. Most of us started by writing about ourselves or things that have happened around us, which makes a good start. That helps you put pen to paper.

I am happy to be part of this group, and, apart, they all make very good understanding friends.

For myself, the group has helped me a great deal in my work – it has become more mature in feeling and in content and I feel now that I can become better each time I write.

Betty Pace

Before I began to write with serious intent, I was a painter in oils. My work was accepted in some of the good exhibitions, but it was so expensive I could not afford to continue. I had almost given up, because producing dozens of pictures no-one was going to see seemed a pointless occupation, when I started to work in pen and ink instead of paint, illustrating the Brunswick News, a community newspaper. I began to write for the paper, which I enjoyed very much as I was able to express my imagination more fully: a pic¬ture is one moment frozen in time. The painter is not able to show the specator what happened before that moment, or after it. Only the writer can do this.

Belonging to a writers’ workshop has given me the in¬centive to go on working. Most writers and artists do not feel understood by other people, so they need the support of their fellows. And, as women are maybe more sensitive and emotional than men, women writers need each other even more. I feel sorry for all the talents which are doomed to wither and die because they remain unseen. People don’t want much. Just a chance to show their work to others, which does not need huge sums of money. Literary anthologies are worth every penny the Arts Council spends on them. They give people the opportunity to use their time doing something worthwhile. In these days of high unemployment this is even more necessary.

Sarah Wright

The written word has been the joy and passion of my life since I was four years old. As a child, unsucc¬essful at anything else, I took solace in the world of books. I began writing poetry at about 11 years of age; the first, unremarkably, being about adoles¬ence. The creative impulse springs from an indiv¬idual’s desire to share a unique vision of existence. The kaleidoscope of life is never the same twice, but the artist is born with a mission to interpret the common experience in a way which will illuminate the mundane, speak for the speechless, and reach out to touch a corner of every soul.

Jan Bridle

I am a working class girl from Brighton. I grew up in a large family. My father was of Irish ancestry, my mother is Welsh. We were brought up as Catholics. I married young and had 3 children quickly. I spent my teenage years bringing up a family. I’ve since taken evening classes, taken ‘O’ levels and then went on to Open University. I’m now running a writing workshop for children on the Moulsecoomb estate. It’s very important to me that children should not be afraid to write, to value their own opinions. Confidence in yourself can change your life: thanks to all involved in the New Horizons course 1979-80.

Writing has always been something that I did, from an early age, but for many years I did not show anyone what I had written. Many of the pieces I wrote when I was a teenager I threw away because I felt that it was something which isolated me, especially if the subject was personal thoughts and feelings, or female diffic¬ulties. I found out about the women writers’ workshop and went along. It has helped me to improve my writ¬ing, to be able to express what I think and feel and not to be inhibited by men being present at my read¬ings. I could now quite easily read in mixed company. Writing, I realise now, was always very important to me but I squashed it because of my lack of confidence. Now I have the confidence to carry on writing and also to look at the structure of my writing in a more pract¬ical way. Writing now figures as a major instead of a minor in my life.

Elaine Sketchtey

I was born in a tiny village in Wales, the first girl after 3 boys. Later, 2 more girls were born making me the middle child amongst a family of six. We moved to Sussex when I was 7, and my whole life changed. The contrast between the spacious Welsh countryside and the uncertainty of where we were going to live left its mark on us all, especially my mother. I viewed from my central position the disharmony sur¬rounding me. At 15 I left home running.

I’ve only recently begun to write, although at the age of 13-14 I unleashed my first prolific burst. When I look back I see it was an attempt to understand myself at a time when the changes taking place within me and around me were very confusing. My words on paper were written from me to me. I was fulfilling a need to write from a purely instinctive urge to release my pent-up emotions: I was discouraged from expressing myself directly amongst my family. Feel¬ings were to be hidden away. So I hid away, and wrote. Unfortunately those writings were lost when I left home.

15 years later, I am writing about my hopes, fears, joy, sadness and anger towards past, present and future. At 30 I am discovering what it means to be a woman in our society and how important it is to be with other women in search of themselves and express¬ing who they are. Writing sorts out the confusion that this seeking involves. Once more, writing is helping me to understand myself. Only this time, I can share it. I don’t feel alone and unusual. As I become acquainted with myself I want my writing to grow rich and powerful. For now, I’m happy to be writing with the support of other women.

Gina Jupp

I was born in a council house in May Road, Brighton. My mother is Irish and my father is Brighton born and grew up in Carlton Hill. I have two brothers and a sister and we all went to Catholic schools. I think I was influenced from both sides of the family. My mother, who went to a convent school till 18 helped us with our education. My father’s family were hard up working class people. He had the survival instinct – where he came from you had to live by your wits. Now I’m a wife and mother of two lovely daughters. I live on a council estate in Brighton and I like to write. So you see, everyone can write! I run a Children’s Writing Workshop with my friend Jan and hope to dev¬elop that in the future.

Jean Cavedaschi

I was born nearly fifty years ago in Stepney, London. As I was born within the sound of Bow Bells, I an a true Cockney. I have two children. I have lived in Brighton for 20 years now, and I love it more as time passes. I write because I have been encouraged to do so by the members of the group. I have no burning desire to write. But I do get pleasure when I get a favourable reaction to something I have written. I therefore continue.

Ursula Howard

You’ll see very little writing by me in this book. I will explain why. I started the group going in March 1984. In my work as an adult education teacher and working with local writers for QueenSpark, I met women who wanted to write, or who were already writ¬ing, but were put off by ‘creative writing’ classes, where accepted views about good Literature seemed to be unquestioned. They did not feel their work belonged. The opposition of men, or even their amused tolerance, was another hindrance to writing. Our group was set up by QueenSpark with the WEA as an adult class. I get paid, as its ‘convenor’. This means I set it up, worry about it, do organising work, write letters, pay bills, do the photocopying, org¬anise readings and trips and meetings with other QueenSpark writers, type out work and so on. I’m not the only one to do those things, but the group sees me as being paid for feeling responsible for a lot of that work. It could be done differently, perhaps with a rota, so new groups starting up could think about the advantages and disadvantages.

One advantage is that it is very clear cut and people can ask me to do things without worrying. No-one has to waste precious writing time in difficult lives. When I first started the group I wasn’t so worried about my own writing, so the system suited me. Helping publish other people’s writing was what I wanted most. Because of the support and insistence of this group I feel different. I want to write. I don’t want to teach, advise or walk alongside other women without putting myself on the line as they do. I don’t want to be so much the one in the middle, the one whose judgement matters most. This is a difficult process: I am clever at hiding. I have a full-time job and two children. I escape easily into public kinds of writing and promoting other people’s real writing because I think the education I’ve had has made me more inhibited about exposing my own self in words. So I rarely write, despite all the gentle encourage¬ment and chiding from the others.

Writing will mean making a gesture to myself, among friends who see it as important; a necessary, solitary rebellion against the constant, confident voices around and inside me demanding that I keep the door on myself shut. It will mean feeling irresponsible. It will mean facing my own dreams and nightmares, beliefs and confusion and turning them inside out. It will mean taking time and finding clean pieces of paper and sharpening pencils, for me. It will mean letting out a bit more weakness among the show of strength. I’m working on it.

Maureen Ivermee

I was born a stone’s throw from Brighton Station during the Second World War. A couple of years later, we moved house into what I now consider the ‘hub’ of Brighton, Carlton Hill. I grew up amongst the hawkers and street traders of my town. My father was a totter. He came from a large family, as did my mother. It wasn’t until I married I realised there was a great big world out there. The world of literature, politics etc. For the first time in my life I felt decidedly excited about living. I attended various evening classes, took a couple of ‘O’ levels and wore my ‘DON’T CUT ADULT EDUCATION’ badge with pride. Here is a brief look at the way I viewed myself, then and now:

Before: Childlike scribble, inhibited by staid cliches and limited vocabulary.

After: Working class ideals, opinions and expressions of art are equally as important as those of the upper classes. After all, we each make up the whole. Therefore, my cultural background should be recorded through whatever source is open to me.

As I wrote the latter, this quick poem came from it:

Upper classes, working classes
We each make up the whole.
Our backgrounds may be different
But we each write from the soul.

No matter where you’ve came from
No matter where you’ve been
To stifle each others’ culture
Is surely a mortal sin.

A revolution in writing
Is taking place right now
We pick up pens instead of guns
To make our points stand proud.

Hard Luck, Boy

There you are
Snug in bed
Covers over
Your head
You’re safe
And you’re snug
And you’re warm
Sleep’s beckoning
Fast.
Here – it’s coming
At last.
Now you’re
Lost to the world
Deeply snoring.

Then you’re
Wrenched from
Your dreams
Sleep’s been
Split
At the seams
She’s leapt from
The bed
Covers trailing
She’s opening
Drawers
And slamming
The doors
And the light’s
Glaring down
From the ceiling.

You open
Your eyes
And you see her
Capsize
To the floor
With a pencil
And paper
She frantically scrawls
While you fight back
The yawns
And you know
Sleep’ll have
To come later.

She mutters
And moans,
Then she grunts
And she groans
And clutches
Her pencil
Still tighter.
But don’t you
Despair
Just find her
A chair…

Hard luck, boy
You live
With a writer.

Jo Stevenson

Words

These words are mine,
This page, this line,
Do with it as I will
Words without you
Where would I be
This page, these words
This paper, ME

Jan Bridle

Standing up to be Counted

What I write is what I feel:
and, privately, I write what I feel:
therefore;
judge me not
by futile arguments,
day-to-day events,
the consequence of a life-time’s patterns:
(that is,
family backgrounds, conflicting evidence)
No:
I am what I write, So
read my paper words
and see
Me
mirrored
there

Sarah Wright

SADIE ABBISS

Oh lonely lonely Bed Sit
Nothing to do but think and sit
Nothing to do but sit and think
And if you’re lucky, eat and drink;
Eat and drink and go to bed,
Be thankful for the cheese and bread;
You’re fortunate to get the cheese;
Say ‘Thankyou’ and for more a ‘Please.’
There’s many a girl been forced to wed
Through eating, drinking, going to bed
In a lonely desolate space, lit
By a single bulb, called a Bed Sit!

Sadie In The Maze

‘Do you know your way around?’
‘I’m learning fast’ I said
‘Do you know what life is all about?’
‘The book is three parts read.’
‘And do you know the way to go?’
‘The Map is in my Hand.
Will it lead me,
If I read it right,
To some Promised Land?
Can I escape the callous Maze
Where all roads are Dead Ends
And find something Miraculous
Around one of these Bends?
Hope unabandoned; Wait and see
What Life has still in store for me?’

I Am A ?

I want to know something about everything
And everything about some things
I want to be tuned into the universe;
Not in Reverse going downhill.
Sometimes I don’t hear the end,
Sometimes I don’t hear the beginning,
Sometimes I miss a beat,
Sometimes the story’s incomplete.
I want to see all, hear all, know all;
But I’m just an ABSOLUTE BEGINNER
AT THE END OF MY TETHER
Aah! What a DILEMMA!

Maya and Mavis

“I bring all I’ve got,”
The Black Writer said,
“To every situation,
Every location.

“When I’m in the taxi,
It’s all there:
When I’m in the studio
It’s all here.”

“Is that not
Being greedy?”
Asked Mavis
Uncomprehendingly.

“But,” said Maya
“I’m giving,
Not taking.”
Giving completely of herself
Was something Mavis did not quite understand.

Written after watching Maya Angelou being interviewed on television.

The Story Of Elizabeth Ann Nock

The shop had been in their family for nearly 40 years, ever since Grandfather Nock had come down from the North, after quarrelling with his elder brother. It had passed to his son, John, who had worked hard and long in his father’s employ for very little in the way of wages.

When John married Harriet, they had taken on the business and Grandfather Nock had retired to a little house in Doughty Street, where he had a garden to keep him occupied. He still kept a watchful eye on the running of the business until he became unable to walk the short distance from his home. The shop had always dominated the life of the family and their days were punctuated by the Bell summoning them once again to the service of the General Public. Anything from an ‘a’p’orth of sweets to the weekly grocery for a whole family. Sometimes, in hard times, ‘on tick’.

John and his wife Harriet had been blessed with three children, Ann, Alice and Henry, known as Harry. Ann was a bright and intelligent girl who obtained her education at a little establishment known as Miss Round’s School. She had done well and Miss Round had wished to retain her services as a Pupil Teacher, but at the age of 14 she had been required by her father to leave Miss Round’s Academy and help in the house and serve in the shop. She accepted it as inevitable and only occasionally dreamt of what might have been. She could have served her time and become a fully qualified Teacher. She might even have ventured beyond the confines of this grim industrial en¬virornment in which she seemed destined to spend the rest of her Life. But Ann made the best of things and was usually cheerful and polite to the customers.

In the 1870s the social life tended to centre around the pub, and the Church. In Ann’s case, it was the chapel that was the centre of things, for her family were non-conformists of the John Wesley School. They did not attend the Ranters Chapel at the end of Aston Street, where they lived, but favoured the more prestigious place of worship, the Wesleyan Chapel, situated in Great Bridge.

The Nock Family pew was a private one near the front of the Chapel and Ann would walk proudly with her family and slide gracefully into her place at the far end of the Family Seat. Dressed in her Sunday best, with her hair and shoes vying with each other for the best shine, she would seat herself demurely and wait for the rest of her family to settle in their places. And as they stood up and launched into the first hymn, she would turn her head and glance up at the balcony where the figure of a tall, fair-haired youth stood singing in his usual place among his brothers. But he was the tallest and the fairest and he was her Jim. Had he not asked her to walk out with him that very night after Chapel. And had she not said, with a toss of her head, “Well, I might, if Father says it’s all right.”

That was the start of their romance and Father had not been very pleased. He did not think that Jim was any match for his eldest child and he had told her so in no uncertain terms. But Ann was not deterred by the opposition and neither was Jim. He walked Ann home from Chapel on Sunday evenings and took to meeting her most evenings after the shop was closed.

On Saturdays he would turn up looking as smart as on Sundays. In summer, when Ann appeared, he would take off his hat in mock salutation and produce a rose from its interior. The neighbours thought he was a policeman because of his height. They were mostly small and stocky people in this Black Country place and anyone approaching the height of six foot was quite outstanding. The romance continued, with a family row either before or after each time she went out with Jim. It was a bit wearing, especially after working in the house and serving in the shop all day.

On March 17th, of the second year of their courting, it happened to be a Thursday, half day closing, and it was Ann’s Birthday. She and Jim travelled to the nearby town of Dudley and Jim bought her an engagement ring from a jeweller’s shop in the market square. Ann had pointed out the ring in the window; it was a gold ring set with small alter¬nating rubies and diamonds and as he placed it on her finger Jim had said “You and me; together always!” She just looked at him and smiled but the happiness was short-lived when she considered the reception the ring would get back home. As she crept in through the back door that night, she had slipped it off and returned the ring to its box. It could not, however, be kept a secret for ever, and when John Nock had discovered his daughter’s serious intention to wed, he was sorely troubled and mightily disapproving. “That boy will bring you nothing but poverty and a house full of kids” he had said and Ann was hurt and saddened by her father’s attitude. “He is a hard worker” she said, “He will be a good provider.” And in her heart she believed it and added to herself, “He is handsome, he is fair, he’s my Jim and nobody is going to turn me from him, not even my Father.”

One night soon after the revealing of the engagement ring, Ann and Jim were taking their nightly walk, up Aston Street, along Toll End Road, into Horseley Road and down Workhouse Lane. They stopped for a bit of a cuddle near the Pit Banks and Ann had said, “I must be back early tonight to help Father with the books”. “You think more of your Father than you do of me. He’s had you all day!” said Jim. “But I must get back to help; you know his eyesight is not very good and he depends on me to do the bookwork for him.” “Is it going to be like this after we are married? Will you still be tied to your Father and his Shop? I can see I shan’t get a look in!” Jim was working himself up into a rare show of temper and by the time they reached the cemetery gates Ann was getting quite annoyed with him. She took off her engagement ring, held it before him, between finger and thumb and carelessly flicked it over the cemetery wall. “There,” she said, “Go and cool your heels looking for that then,” and Jim, with a leap, was over the wall searching in the grass among the gravestones until he found it. “What did you do that for, you silly Wench,’ he said, as he leaped back over the wall and took her in his arms; then holding her hand he replaced the ring carefully upon the third finger of her left hand. “Don’t do that again, will you” he pleaded with his eyes, while his voice was stern. “I won’t grumble again,” he said. “I know what a position you are in. I know how difficult things are for you at home. It won’t be much longer. When you are 21, we will marry.” “My Father will never consent.” “He doesn’t need to; when you are 21 you can marry without his consent.” “But you know that I will never be able to marry you from home.” “Then we will get married in Dudley at Kate’s Hill Church. I will go and stay with my brother Eli and we will have the Banns read in Dudley and get married next Easter, after your Birthday.” “Do you mean it, Jim?” “Of course” “Why didn’t we think of that before?” “Well, I was talking it over with Eli when he came to visit us last weekend and he suggested it.” “Where shall we live?” asked Ann. “There’s an empty house next door to Mrs. Percival down the lane. One of those back-to-back ones, just one up and one down, but it will be enough for us to begin with.”

From then on they were filled with ideas for the future; the Plan was put into operation; Ann went to see the dressmaker and was fitted for a costume of cream silk brocade, for Sundays, she told her family. Her sister Alice, was in on the secret but she dared not tell her Father and Mother until the day before the Saturday of their wedding.

“I must have tomorrow off, Father. Our Alice will be able to manage and Rose from next door says she will come in to help.” “And where are you off to, Madam?” enquired her Father. “I’m going to be married,” said Ann bravely. Her Father went very pale. Before he could say anything, Ann continued, “I’ll come back and help you for a few months until you can make other arrangements. Rose will be able to come and help when she leaves school.” “You’ll need to come back for more than a few months, I’ll be bound,” retorted her Father . “Where’s the money coming from? That’s what I’d like to know. How can a Labourer like Jim Abbiss keep a wife in comfort. You’ll have to work to keep the shirt on his back and what will happen when you have children? Have you thought of that?”

Ann had thought of that and the prospect pleased her. What is more,she looked forward more that she could say to having Jim to herself, in a house of her own, where she could do as she pleased, within reason. What could be more like Heaven on Earth than a place of their own, no matter how small, no matter how poor and sparsely furnished – what could be even better – a family of their own!

Jim and Ann were married at Kate’s Hill Church, Dudley; their first child was born and took his first steps in the little house in Workhouse Lane.

The Nocks eventually came round and there was a reconciliation. Grandma Nock even wanted the first child to be called, James Alfred Nock-Abbiss, but Ann said, “With a name like that, what a time the poor boy would have at school.” She said sorry to Grandma but she didn’t think it would do.

Jim and Ann had seven more children, one dying in infancy. Six sons and one daughter grew to maturity. The daughter was the youngest. Her name was Mabel Elizabeth. I am the daughter of Mabel Elizabeth. When the family had grown and the older ones had gone their different ways, Ann was able to buy a shop of her own; No: 12 Horseley Road, Tipton. That is where I was born.

Boyz Meanz Noiz

Why are boys so noisy?
And when they communicate
Why do they shout
With such loud voices?
Why do they kick tin cans
And ignore their parents
In the park?
Why can’t they be more civilized,
Like girls?

Night Watch

It’s dark out the back
As black as a Bat
Just the shaded eye of a distant house
And the winking light of a Plane in Flight.

There’s a rustling in the undergrowth
Strange happenings in the Garden Jungle;
The curtain of night is rent by the SCREAM
Of a Battling Cat !!
The Wild War Whoop splits the Suburban Silence!

Pollution: Brighton & Los Angeles

On coming down to London Road from Brighton Station at the time of the 1984 Olympics …

Pumping Lead,
Not ‘Pumping Iron’
Into the Atmosphere.
Captains of Industry
And Petro Chemicals
BEWARE!
Your children and grandchildren.
Could be poisoned
By this foul Lead-Laden Air!

MARGARET BEARFIELD

There’s a box on the beach
A strange colour – green and red
No one’s around – well, it’s winter,
And I’m early from my bed.
6.30 a.m., getting light;
Now the box has a luminous glow.
It’s a very large box, heavy metal –
I wonder what it could contain.
It’s best not to prod or to poke it –
Besides, it has started to rain.
It could contain something lethal
Some substance could poison the air
I raise up my eyes to the heavens –
I’m bathed in a silver light.
I try to run from it,
But my body is locked by fright.
My eyes feel very heavy,
I collapse upon the beach.
Then my body feels weightless,
Floating out to sea.
A sensation that I’m flying,
Then hands pull me to land
Upon a lush green pasture
I brace up for the thud –
But it’s really gentle
Like stepping into mud.
I tell myself it’s all a dream –
I haven’t left my bed.
I pinch and shake myself
and slap about my head.
But no, it isn’t dreaming
I’m very wide awake.
A tall grey figure then appeared,
No words did he speak, and yet
Those words came to me whispered
In my head:
Come follow –
So I walked behind
Although he looked a giant,
And wore metallic grey.
I felt no fear, I’m very glad to say.
We stopped beside a spacecraft
Of green and brilliant red;
I felt his words in my brain –
This is what he said:
“Earthman, the box upon the beach
Was lost from our spaceship
And as you were quite near
We beamed you up together
But you will not be harmed
And will return to earth soon
Please don’t be alarmed.
We will give you some silver dust
To keep in this small box.
If you should wish to join us
For any length of time
Just sprinkle it upon you
And keep a peacful mind”.
I’m safely on the beach now
The day is bright and clear
And suddenly I remember
The box, the box, Oh dear.
I feel inside my pocket
And clutch it in my hand.
But foolishly I open it
And trip upon the sand.
The silver dust is scattered,
The tide laps at my feet.
The little tin starts bobbing
On the water, out of reach.

Hopping down in Kent

We are going hopping – the Cockney lad did chirp.
Me father’s gone and left us and mother’s got no work.
We’ve packed our stuff in boxes and blankets for the bed,
And ’cause me father left us, we are taking Uncle Fred.
So off we go a’hopping down in Kent.

We arrive at the farm – O, it does look a sight.
There’s a row of tin huts where we sleep at night.
People arrive to help pick the hops,
Bringing tables and chairs,
And lots of their children who race all around,
Amongst food and belongings left on the ground.
So here we are a’hopping, hopping down in Kent.

Uncle Fred builds a fire that lights in a flash;
Made with faggots and paper, and a few bits of trash.
We sit on the ground while mother makes tea;
It’s some nice bread and jam, but the tea’s smokey.
We are inside the hut ’cause it began to get dark,
Mum lights a candle, Uncle Fred said ‘Ark.
What’s that then girl?’ Mum whispered in his ear –
‘They are peeing in their buckets,
There aint no toilets ‘ere.’
And to make matters worse,
We all have to sleep in the same bloody bed-
There’s me and me Mum and of course Uncle Fred.

Very early in the morning we all have to be
Down the garden picking, so we take our lunch and tea.
‘Ow it’s nice down the garden’, everybody sings.
I help me Mum pick from the vine accross the bin.
When the measurer man canes round he shouts
‘Get them bleedin’ hops off the ground’ –
And when he takes the measure he takes the blooming lot.
Then a big ugly bloke takes ’em
To the oast house to be dried.
I’ve heard the roar of the furnaces inside.

They’re lovely hops, yus, they’re lovely hops.
One shilling a bushel the farmer said he’d pay.
Mum said that’s good – we earned thirty bob today.
And on Friday we can have a sub –
So it’s fish and chips for supper
And a pint in the pub for poor Uncle Fred,
Then we all have to sleep in the same bloody bed.

When hopping is all over, Mum’s money nearly spent,
Just enough left over to take back for the rent,
But we’ve had a lovely time hopping down in Kent.
We packed up all our boxes and our hopping pot
So, no more bonfire dinners, or the back-yard trots.
They say that hopping’s lousy,
I don’t believe it’s true,
‘Cause we only go down hopping to earn a bob or two.

Now I’m back in Brighton, with Mum and Uncle Fred,
But thank Gawd I can sleep in my own bloody bed.

The Arrangement

“Hello Brian, I didn’t expect to see you home so early.” “I’m not home for long, I have to see a new client in the High Street at 3, so I thought I’d come home for an hour and have a spot of lunch. How did your day go Ann?”
“O the usual Monday morning surgery is always busier, and there is such a lot of flu about.” “Yes I know, John Barron and his wife are ill with it. I’ll just have to keep my fingers crossed. O by the way, I could be late again tonight, there is quite a lot of paper work to catch up on.” “O Brian, Julie Carr was in the surgery this morning. She came out of the consulting room like a Siamese cat – positively purring.”
“She’s obviously not ill then?”
“No, but….” “Come on Ann.” “She’s pregnant.”
“What?” “pregnant.” “She told you?” “No, it was on her notes. We will just have to act surprised when she tells us. I’m very happy for her. She was always saying how bored she was since Jack took the job on the oil rig. And they have been married for seven years.”
“What the hell has that got to do with it.”
“Brian please, you’re shouting.”
“Sorry, but I don’t get your point.” “Well, my point is they must have been trying hard to have this baby. I know she mentioned about 3 years ago she was going to have tests at the hospital. Anyway, she looked elated.”
“Ann, I have to go. I’ve been home almost an hour.”
“Are you sure you’re feeling well Brian? You look very pale. Don’t say you’re going down with the flu.” “No, I’m O.K. Got lots on my mind at the moment. I’ll ring you later. Bye.”
“Julie.” “Yes, hello Brian – you don’t usually ring me at the shop. Anything wrong?”
“Julie, I must see you today. Can you arrange something? The Bridge Hotel at six? Good. We’ll talk then. Bye.”
“Good God Brian, you look ghastly.” “I feel it. Why didn’t you tell me that you could be pregnant?”
“You know?” “Yes, Ann told me.”
“How bloody dare she?” “Look Julie, don’t get steamed up. She’s very happy for you. She saw you this morning and said you looked positively glowing and when she collected the notes, noticed that you’ve had a preg¬nancy test. She told me, but she’s not likely to mention it to anyone else. But let’s not concern ourselves about that. What on earth are we going to do? How long’s Jack been away?” “Four months, and I’m eight weeks pregnant.” “Don’t worry Julie, I’ll get you into a private clinic.”
“I don’t think you realise Brian. I want this child, and I’m going to keep it.”
“How can you Julie? It would ruin us, all of us, Ann, the boys, Jack….”
“O don’t worry about Jack, Brian. He knows.”
“Knows? You’ve told him?”
“I sent off a message today. He will have recieved it, I hope, by now. He will be thrilled as much as me.”
“So he thinks it’s his baby?”
“No, O no. I told him about us weeks ago.” “You bloody fool Julie, you idiot.” “Don’t get so up-tight Brian. I’m not, and neither is Jack. Listen, Jack knew you fancied me. We often spoke about it and, well, we always got on so well. And that night you flirted with me at Mr. and Mrs. Arthur’s Silver Wedding do, Jack noticed. I’ve always been very fond of you Brian, please listen. Jack and I had been married four years and trying hard to have a baby. I thought it was my fault. We both had tests at the hospital. I was fine, but Jack, they discovered, could never have a child. We thought about adoption and other methods. But deep down I longed to carry my own child. And, as I’ve said, I’m very fond of you Brian, and I think you’re a super father. And Jack knows you could never be a threat to our marriage when he comes home in two weeks. That’s the last time he will work away. We plan to sell up and move away in any case, so you will have no fear of Ann ever know¬ing. She will believe it’s Jack’s, as will everyone else. So don’t you see, Brian – I’m happy. Surely you can see it’s all for the best, all for the best.”
“My God, you mean you both schemed this – you and Jack. You put me up as a bloody stud.”

Helen

I first met Helen one cold damp November afternoon, walking up the hill towards the library. She was muffled in a large heavy tweed coat, and long scarf half covering her face. As we drew level, she pulled down the scarf, scraping her mouth, and the scarlet lipstick smudged onto her chin.

Her voice, low and husky asked, “Can you spare 10p for a cuppa?” Our eyes met, hers grey and indiff¬erent; mine, I suspect, blank and wide. “I’m sorry”, I replied, jolting back after thinking how on earth I was going to make the dentist, cook dinner and get to Friends Centre all in one and a half hours. I had taken far too long choosing my books. “Got 10p for a cuppa, please?” I felt in my pocket; and only find¬ing a few coppers opened my purse, handing her 50p and mentally thinking, I’ve never seen a tramp wearing lipstick before. She almost snatched the coin and, pulling the scarf back over the mouth, walked up the hill.

It was several weeks before I was to meet her again – and a New Year. January 5th had been a very cold day, but the air was crisp and dry as I walked home through the park.

There she was, the tramp woman, sitting on the concrete ground gazing into the half-frozen pond. “Hello”, I said, slowly passing her. “How are you?” and realised at once what a stupid thing I’d said, as she very obviously wasn’t alright. Her face was purple and swollen, her hands were blue and her feet were bound in filthy rags. Her eyes blinked. I stopped and turned towards her. I could see she remembered me – she half raised her arm and a wave of her hand which I mistook at first as a gesture, the ‘clear off and leave me alone’ kind.

I stood awkward, feeling foolish almost. Then seeing the grey eyes brim then gush with tears, she raised her arm again and I realised she was asking me to help her up. I tried in vain, first by standing at her back and putting my hand under her arm pits – but she was so laden down with clothes it was imposs¬ible. Then I held out my hands to her – her grip was too weak – I knew she was very ill. I bent down and said, “I’m going to get some help. What is your name?” Her voice came weak and childlike, “Helen – my name is Helen.”

I ran to the phone box on the edge of the park. My fingers, cold and stiff, dialled three nines. I ran back down to the park to Helen who was now no longer sitting but lying in a crumpled heap like a pile of old clothes. I knelt down. “Helen, Helen.” I called gently, “Someone is coming to help you. You’ll soon be tucked up nice and warm.” I felt guilty not know¬ing how else to comfort her. Her eyes closed, and the tears she shed made thin white streaks down her grey, dirty face. I called “Helen,” again. She raised her hand and her fingers touched my cheek. Help came in the shape of two young policemen, then the ambulance crew. “Drunk?” They directed the ques¬tion to the policemen, but my reply came quickly back, “No, she’s ill,” and my voice almost whispered the next words, “and I think she’s in pain.” “Not any more, Love,” the man with the small dark bag said. “She’s dead.”

Poverty

“Mum I can’t go to school my shoes are too worn”
“Go tell your father, it’s his place not mine.
My job’s enough to feed your bellies.”
“Mum, Mum I can’t sleep, The blankets itch.”
“Where’s your sheet?” “It’s ripped.”
“Mummy I’m cold, my coat is worn, thin and old.”
“O sod off, I’m sick of it.”
Everywhere I look there’s poverty.
Remember Mr. Smith, whose dick got caught in his zip
‘Cause no underpants he wore?
And old Flora up the street, at sixty five a whore.
Poverty, poverty, scraping every day;
Waiting at the pawn shop when. your man has got no pay.
I sit inside the lavie with newspaper up me bum;
Turn me upside down you could read the bleedin’ Sun.
Poverty, poverty, put blacking on your knees
‘Cause your trousers are worn thin.
The wind that comes awhistling
Chills you to the skin.
Poverty, poverty, when there’s not enough to eat
I go off to the market for cheap greengroceries and meat.
Then it’s off to the coal yard to nick a bit of slack-
But we can only do it if the gaffa turns his back.
Poverty, poverty, father’s in the pub;
My mother’s gone to bash him-
Well, the money was for grub.
My sister Fan looks really grand
She’s dressed up in fancy furs;
They came off the totter’s barra –
Mixed up in rabbit’s turds.
Mother shouts “Don’t walk down wind,
Else they’ll shoot you for pie.”
“You always have to spoil it” I heard my sister cry.

JAN BRIDLE

I want to write about the light
Light is all around us
Light is to reach into
Into the floating air of light
We can find an answer.
Goodness like pure air
Helps us to breath easy
In the darkest days.
Out in the undergrowth
of troubled life
Reach for light.
Do not wallow in the shadows
For in your head and heart
There! is light
Down underneath the muggy scars
of the world
There! is the power
The power is light not dark
Take the power,
Use it!
Climb up to the light,
Struggle and claw to the light
Memories punish.
Wash them away
Start now with the power
The light
The light, the light
Reach for it
Hold it precious in your hands,
Clutch it, keep it
Treasure it like a hundred treasures
YOU HAVE THE LIGHT

ATOMS OF LIFE
EACH ONE SO IMPORTANT
THAT MINUTE EVENT
THOSE LOST FRAGILE PIECES
THOSE GAPS IN THE PATH
THAT TINY HAPPENING
A LIFE TIME CAN LAST
ATOMS GET MISSED
AND WE CAN’T BE WHOLE.

WHERE ARE THEY, THE SPLINTERS

WHERE ARE THEY THE SPLINTERS
THAT ALTER THE WHOLE
ARE THEY BACK DOWN
THE WAY WE’VE ALREADY COME?
CAN WE PULL THEM TOGETHER
CAN’T FIX IT BACK RIGHT
THEY ARE TOO EVASIVE
ATOMS OF LIFE

With passing of time
Lights flicker in the deep
Like the flow of the blood
Hearts pound in the rivers
Rivers run cruel, soft and full
Ripples of life
The waves angry rule
Beyond all the panic
The sun is still bright
It looks for a portal
To pour in the light
The magic of mountains
Makes fun of the hills
Memories forgotten
Make people stand still.

Energy stored wasted
Into everything
out nothing
And the cry of the soul
Is like silent echoes
Into the tunnel of life
Searching forever
Into the depth of my being
I’m a fake
I’m a drag
And into an eternal cement mixer
I am ground until
there are no lumps
Ground to a smooth paste
Spat out onto the ground
Smoothed out lie dried and hard
No cracks must appear
To expose me
would be unthinkable.

In the new world
There will be just people
No raping bastards
No night time creeping
Sadist sods
Who will kill our kids
Perverted nuts
Who like to give
a fracture to unsuspecting
Skulls
This will be all old
In the new world.

Mum, stop doing the washing,
Mum, listen, stop hoovering the floor,
Mum, sit at the table with me,
I’ll tell you about my day.

Mum, you can scrub the floor tomorrow,
Mum, these chores can be done any time,
Mum, it’s very important that you listen,
I’ll not be reliving this day.

Metal, keep your metal,
Must not let a petal
Drift in to the core,

Windy days are dangerous,
Leaves cascade
Around us,
Hard, hard, metal
Can roses bloom once more.

Entire lives wasted
On cases
That have no answer
Wasted.
Waste is sinful
Get a bin
Climb on in to the rubbish tip
Of lives wasted.

Forgiving

Night comes down around us
Seething red,
A thousand long summers gone
Bow the head,
Diamonds flash and then are fled.
Moments, whisper,
The Duelists dead.

My life’s in that bag,
I should throw it away,
The scribbled words
The aspirations the degradations
of a life.
I should dispose of it,
But it’s my life,
My marriage is in that bag
My children
My divorce
My memories
My thoughts
All in that bag
It’s my life
My destruction
My hope
My defeat
My dreams, and my nightmare
In that bag,
I’ll go to work in a shop
Stop scribbling, quibbling
With words.

On My Own

My house is comfortable
Not spotless clean.
My house is how
I’ve wanted it to be.

I hear the whisper of grass
Growing faster, faster, fast.

Striving activity of mind
Then you still care
Or is it just to preserve your sanity
The more complex the thought
The more doubtful the simple truth.

The world of man is doubtful
The world of god is like reaching into air
The belief would bring peace
Though how can logic
Find answers in the air

Running across the Downs alone
Concentrating
Breathing easy and free
Contemplating
Peeling off frustration
So elating
Body mind and soul
A power station

I tried to write a love song
It just didn’t come,
I wanted to tell our story,
The words just wouldn’t run,
I wanted to remember the way I feel today,
Yet there is nothing left to say.

They were just children
Balanced on the edge of the world.
Clasping broken stars
That shone a million years ahead.
Just children …

They were just children
Travelling many ways
Holding fantastic treasure in their hands
It scattered triple on the hand
Just children …

They were just children
held by golden bands
The glory of the treasure
faded in their hands

They were just children
searching the silver path …
Gathering back the pieces of the stars
that they had lost
Just children.

JEAN CAVEDASCHI

Young Love: Triple Reflections

1

Young love is an incandescant thing, a nebulous thing. Trying to recapture the feeling is like trying to hold mist in cupped hands. One can sometimes experience a fleeting reminder, perhaps through a melody that was special at that time and occasionally the searching of one’s memory can bring forward the beloved face of that young love. The passion of young love is the most intense and the most dreadful. The depth of passion is quite fright¬ening and yet truly wonderful. It is rarely repeated and, in truth, it would be difficult to repeat as each new relationship brings different feelings and emotions. As one matures, love develops. It becomes more com¬plicated as priorities change. Maybe this is why we always remember young love with fondness and nost¬algia. Its freedom and simplicity allowed one to enjoy love for what it was. We do not think of the bad times and partings are recalled with poignancy rather than anger.

All the world loves a lover they say, but it’s the young lovers who win sympathy and encouragement when up against it.

Almost everyone will experience young love. It is important that they do. Young love enriches and enhances life. It is the stuff happy memories are made of. It shines brightly in the lives of the young and burns dimly in the recesses of the older mind, treasured thoughts to be stored and savoured forever.

2

I watch her struggle with the pain of another parting. Yet another romance has come to an end, and once again she is devastated. My heart breaks as hers breaks but I cannot bear this loss for her. She is a gentle soul in spite of her ever-hardening exterior. She is bewildered by the constant betrayal of her generous nature and unstinting love. She thought love meant caring and sharing, not unrelieved taking. Love has been a violent experience, brutal and destructive.

My attempts to console her don’t really reach through her agony and I fear that she no longer believes me when I tell her that love can be beautiful and ful¬filling, and that one day she will be enveloped in the softness of a tender, merciful love. There are people who can respond to her needs with a gentle expression of warmth.

This must be hard to accept, when she feels such sadness. Each time she hopes, each time hopes are dashed. My concern is that the damage will be too severe to repair, but hope must be maintained. Tears must be mopped, encouragement given, a fervent prayer offered that, soon, true love will come her way and eclipse the misery of the past. It will be so good to see her finally happy and relaxed in the safety of a precious, close relationship.

3

He was tall
And he was bold
My Dad said
‘He’s too old’.

He was blonde
And he was bright
I thought
He must be ‘Mr.Right’.

He was handsome
eyes of blue
How I loved him
…Mmmm! I still do!!

Autumn

This morning there is a distinct feeling of Autumn. The leaves have begun to darken before turning brown and the grass is bespangled with September dew. There are signs of quiet preparation for the winter that will follow, the earth is settling down in readiness, the sun has lost the eye-blinking brightness of summer but is still warm enoughto encourage the Autumn flowers to bloom. The conkers are waiting to be harvested by armies of small boys and the last fruits are almost picked. The atmosphere is subdued and the days, though shorter, seem to pass at a much slower pace. The wind that was so pleasant in the heat of the summer has developed chilly fingers and the rain has become, somehow, wetter.

Autumn for me, brings a period of re¬flection and meditation. Reflections of brash, thrusting urgency of Spring, all eager to dressthe land in green after the barren winter months. Memories of the fun days of summer, energy-high and full of electrically charged activities. Sociable gatherings of treasured friends filled to overflowing with laughter. Meditation in preparation for the months to come. Regulating my pulse to that of autumn, conditioning my mind to the winding down of the year. Looking forward to the semi-hibernation of winter and the temporary isolation.

Autumn is a muted season, viewed by some as the dying of the year. I view it as a time of rest and peace, a time to take stock and a time to plan for the next glorious beginning.

URSULA HOWARD

Single Children

These are not
the children of ease;
scorched as they are
by early knowledge
of others’ pain.
Over again.

They live in a box
but with only three sides
the fourth
a flapping membrane
of see-through cellophane
where those who live
behind the borderland
can peer and not be seen

Friends, lovers
always let in,
hers? Ours? Hers? Ours?
Some stay,
or come again.

They have been
at far too many creches
while their mother
talked eyes alight
to others.

Stuck together
peeled; raw and weeping
they come out fighting
tears which spurt
in glass-edged droplets.
They have each other.

Sharp, kind
and understanding
they are gentle with
the innocence of others,
competent in the world.

To her,
they say thank you
for looking after me
when I was ill.
Blind expectations
are not there.

She’s gone out, running
“She said ten minutes,
more like three days”,
he said, not turning round.

But wild shots of anger
(How dare she cost us that
loss, and loss again)
explode in tumult
spitting cruelties.

Listen, listen
talk to me, mother.
Talking about everything
is not my way, but

we do not want
to be the objects
of childcare.
You have made us
with your lunatic life
people
who demand relationships
from those they’re with.
Take time.
You’ll see.
From us, too
you can learn
and laugh.

MAUREEN IVERMEE

I so envied her belly
that Julia’s along the road.
Inside her the life
the child that just now showed.

As Peter fondled her tummy
my thoughts returned to when
I myself was pregnant,
once and then again.

If only I’d realised
just how barren I’d feel.
I’d never have done it,
Time cannot always heal.

It’s somehow devalued lovemaking,
It’s taken away the risks.
It’s dried me up, it’s fucked me up.
It’s taken away the bliss…..

Early Memories 1943-4

Pretty smocked dresses,
hard cotton socks,
Loose elastic in knickers.
Cheap fish ‘n’ chips.

Teacher’s floral smock,
camp beds for naps.
Tiny milk bottles,
Lice infested hair.

Pubs on each corner
sweet ginger beer.
Bags of blue salt,
in packets of crisps.

Lavender-Dettol,
carbolic and coal.
Slipping on rugs,
The bedrooms are cold.

Brothers and sister,
all by the fire.
Dad’s in the frontroom,
with us doing sketching
Mum’s making cakes, out in the kitchen.

Voice From Above

Terrified of the raging tempest, I huddle under the dining table. A tightly tied human knot quivering with fear.

Was God angry with me for forgetting my prayers again? I must admit I had been neglecting to say them every day of late. His thunderous voice reproached me, bellowing from the smouldering grey heavens. His accusing finger flashed earthwards pointing me out as a sinner, and like a sponge I soaked up the fury of his wrath.

Rumbling and grumbling he paces the very room in which I hide. Oh dear dare I speak to him and try to excuse myself, no can’t. I’ll think it instead, he’ll know.

Damp with perspiration, and limp with fear, I begin to repeat over and over again in my mind, I’ll be good, I promise I’ll pray every day God. I’ll never tell lies or tread on ants. I’m the one that always cleans the smelly rabbits-hutch out, and it’s not even my pet. Please go back to heaven God.

Listen, is his rage subsiding? He’s going away! Yes he’s grumbling off into the distance somewhere. What’s that he’s muttering? Something to the effect that he’ll return should I misbehave myself in the future.

Dare I emerge from the shelter of my small, dark cave. I must try to untangle myself. It’s a slow process as I’m afraid I might be caught off guard. With clammy hands and even wetter brow I decide to surface. How heavy the stormy air is, hanging over me like a moist weighty blanket.

I lift the corner of the cloth (that served as a barricade between me and certain hell) to peep out into the now uncannily quiet room. Yes it’s quite safe now, he’s gone.

I knew all the time God wouldn’t hurt me, he never harms little children, the bible say’s so. I must always remember that.

It’s that awful Miss Bloomsfield’s fault. She scares us all with her dreadful fire and brimstone religion. How I love the scriptures, but how she has instilled the fear of God into me.

I like her country-worn face, her dark greying hair braided accross the top of her head, like a micrame tiara. The uniform of her office, ruler of little girls.

I’m exhausted now, I’ll stay here in my cavern of security and sleep. As I drift into slumber I notice the intricate embroidery trimming the boundery of the tablecloth , colourful birds and flowers entwine together, united eternally by linen and thread. Created at the hands of an old lady who herself was created by God. Oh goodness me, I mustn’t forget! Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name ……….

When a girl
the blood of a woman
came to me.
Along with this
came the misery.

The anger rose
each time of the month.
The pain, the ache,
the pump pump pump.

This woman’s blood
flowed between my legs.
It was soon to become
My worlds worst dread.

Menstruation I discovered
meant that I
could now become
a mother…a mother…a mother!!!

A woman now !!
my mother exclaimed.
She never ventured
to explain.

Why a girl
had to bleed
a woman’s blood,
she said it came from ‘Him’ above.

When a girl
an Immaculate Conception
was my dread.
fearfully afraid
the Lord would find my bed.

Maureen Ivermee.

Summer Evenings

Swallows and Swifts
at dusk play.
Their silhouettes
like boomerangs
against the setting day.

Gathering the laundry
In the fading light,
Perfume of Honeysuckle
drifts in on the night.

How we were
Shunned for befriending Arabs
How we were
Mocked for acquiring knowledge
How we were
Scorned for showing tolerance.

How impressed we were
With our hosts’ hospitality
How surprised we were
With our hosts’ generosity
How grateful we were
With our hosts’ sincerity.

How long will it be like this.
When will it change?
For surely we are –
All and the same.

WHY ON EARTH?

At my birth
I began to die.
Beginning of the end,
Can you tell me why?

Why am I here?
What is expected of me?
Life is a labyrinth
That puzzles me.

Am I so blind
I can not see?
The path I must walk
Totally evades me.

I was placed on this earth
I know not why.
All I know for certain
Is that quite soon I will die.

GINA JUPP

Oh what a lovely week-end,
No screaming kids,
No dirty pans,
Just the time, to sit and scan,
The beautiful countryside,
So still, yet, bustling with life,
Isn’t this just wonderful,
To ease the strife,
Of our busy, busy life.

The Family

When I want to talk,
No-one’s there,
Just an empty chair.

But when they want to talk,
Sit and listen,
Don’t you bristle,
Make the time.

He’s tall,
I’m small,
I’m fat
He’s thin,
He’s dark,
I’m fair,
His eyes are brown,
Mine’s grey.

I’ve loved him 14 years
Some of laughter
Some of tears
It’s our anniversary,
So ‘Here’s to us”, Cheers!

I’m the odd man out
I want to shout
I’m human too.
Don’t walk by me
Just try me
Stay by me
Don’t lie to me
I can be trusted,
I’m not a fool.
Why are you so cool,
LET ME IN.

Anna

Daughter of mine
With your hair so fair,
Your big blue eyes
Your stubborn chin,
Your terrible din,
Your lovely round face,
Your tears, when in disgrace,
But how I love you,
And all the trouble you are
Is all from afar
Because you are discovering who you are.

Mona

She’s tall with long hair,
Not really dark, not really fair.
Her lovely blue eyes are
Often masked with anger
And the tantrums are frequent,
But! Mona, we know and we care
That you are changing from a child
into a woman,
And very soon
Everything won’t seem so black,
And you’ll realise
We love you,
More than words can say
or sentiment can convey.

JULIE MACALPINE

Remember,
If you touch me I will crumble
My lined form turn to dust
Answering no former sweetnesses,
Not even ourselves,
Our loving brilliances
will depart.

Read,
And answer me no more
Not even I myself
Can hide a human heart
All
Will vanish
Into dust.

Do not neglect life
Or destroy it
All human life has value
And is good
We do not kill
But despise emptiness.

Love is all its purposes
And only time will tell
How many paths
Cross the world,
Give peace
Not to nothingness condemn.

Your face in the glass
Lies thinking.
In the cold silver,
The soft twilight glows
Like poppies,
The winds and waters sing
As you fling away your cloak.

Rocks and glens flee further
Away than the dead forest;
Two candles burn,
The storm dances
As the path winds higher
To the summit

List to the lisping sea
Lisping sea-chime
Starfish woke the rhyme
Wetness wielded it.

Across the yellow hills
The red bee mates
But seven are the cherry-leaves
That the beetle tastes.

Dredge the seaweed from its moving bed
The apple-juice from apples red
Sunset from its edge of time
Dark memory from the road of lime.

OLIVE MASTERSON

Another Way In

My mother, who was a true homemaker, had virtually no outside interests and as the war progressed I started to take her occasionally to the cinema on Sunday evenings. On one such occasion when returning home we both discovered that we had left our door keys in the house, my mother started to get slightly panicky. I told her not to worry and that I would go and see if my father had his.

He was across the road playing cards in the Parks and Gardens Social Club. This was one of his favourite pastimes. When I walked in and asked, “Have you got your door key, because Mum and I cannot get in!” he raised one eye, whilst keeping the other on his hand, and very nonchalently said “No I haven’t.”, and then was lost once more in his plan of play.

I returned to my mother and she was getting agitated, thinking we would never get in the house. I must explain that it was winter time and also we had just had a delivery of coal. We had a side entrance to our house with a small trap door which enabled the coal man to deliver the coal without entering the house. The ARP station was quite nearby, so I had an idea of getting one of the wardens to bring a ladder over and get through a bedroom window. I told my mother of my plan and off I went. The officer in charge was very helpful, and within minutes we were back at the house.

I went up the side of the entrance and the scene that met me was like something from a comedy and yet at the same time was quite pathetic. Mother, who had by this time worked herself up into a state of fear (you must remember it was wartime and being locked out of one’s house in the blackout and with the possibility of an air-raid any minute was not something that one really wanted to do) had taken things into her own hands. She had removed her best hat, coat and dress, and was standing in her petticoat surrounded by coal which she had been scraping with her hands through the trap door. Her idea was to try and squeeze herself through and out into the kitchen.

I quickly recovered from the shock and said, “Good gracious, what are you doing? The ARP man is here and you will get pneumonia!” I wrapped her coat around her and the warden, oblivious to all that was happening, shinned up the ladder into the bedroom and within seconds had opened the front door.

Thomas

He came to us today, this tiny scrap of humanity, cream and pink and so soft to touch, perfect in det¬ailed miniature. I cradled him in my arms and welcomed him as I had welcomed his mother those years before. He whimpered and struggled to open his eyes for the first glimpse of this world of ours. May he thrive and grow strong and straight as a tree in body and mind. And live a full, happy, healthy life, finding peace and love in the shelter of his caring family.

Nine months
I carried you,
With love and pain
I delivered you,
Through childhood
I nurtured you,
In youth
I supported you
In grief
I comforted you,
I ask nothing
from you.
Only
That you love me.

Suddenly, the light of life is extinguished,
Suddenly, night and day merge together,
There is no beginning of day, no end of night.
Suddenly, the mind is suffocated with thought,
Of sadness, anger, pity, loneliness,
Expanding the brain to bursting point,
Suddenly there is no past, no present, no future,
Will the calm of peace appear as suddenly?

PEPPER MOTH

Tension Suspension

Tension, suspension
My strings are going to snap,
I feel them stretching,
I can’t take that.

Distended, burst soon,
Crack open and release the pressure,
Explode into freedom,
Take the prison away.

The tension has burst
And catapulted me into the mist,
Peace, let the calm swallow me.
Now take me up.

Fly me to a tranquil place
Where I can absorb peace
And be alone with myself to think
Just for a while.

Then lift me up once more
To take up life
And live again.

The Wall

There is a wall that keeps us out
An elctric wall from within and without
Within this wall holds life sacred and dear
Their cries for freedom we can clearly hear
Its a living death this wall beholds
For their souls are empty, their hearts bleed cold
We will ever see these people free
My aunts, uncles and cousins, they belong to me!

Northy

Her room is quiet now, no more hussle and bussle where she moved around all day and sometimes night, doing nothing, but busy all the same.

Now she lays on her bed dying, her face serene, unclouded, all pain long gone, hours, days since past.

Her doll, she called her Baby sits on her dressing table watching, no more to be cuddled by this little old lady.

Life is leaving her now, slowly, her breathing is begining to cease, each breath is weaker than the last.

Does she know I’m here by her bed, can she hear me I wonder? …. She is leaving here, one last gasp, she has now departed.

She died with no family by her bedside, just a stranger with her in her hour of need.

We are only a tenant on this planet, and when our Rent-Book is full, then it’s time to vacate the room, and when you have gone, new life takes over.

I am not infatuated with death,
I have watched the living breath leave the old – such a sweet exit,
to sleep forever.

Who’s Pretty

Who’s pretty
She’s pretty
What a pity
I’m not the one.

Who’s witty
She’s witty
Witty pretty
I’ve not begun.

No sense
Common sense
It’s all pretence
I won’t take the shun.

Choose me
Can’t you see
I’m pretty and witty
Please don’t make fun.

No where
No space
No care
For my face.

Won’t fit
Misfit
Jump in the pit
I hate it.

Couples

In the begining
I watch the couples
Ride their tracks
Side by side.

As time goes by
Their tracks can divide
Mole hills get in the way
Before they meet again
To ride along side by side.

What does the future bring
There are mountains ahead
They stand defiant
Towering and glaring down at them
With an indescribable superiority

All too soon the mountains are here
The couple must part now
It may be forever- but whatever
It’s going to be a rough ride
He grumbles and boulders cascade down on them
Hurt, bruising numbs their very being
Before they ride along side by side.

This life long track goes on for all
Their tunnel can be long, dark and cold
They reflect on the good days and recall
Happiness spent side by side.

Now stiff cracked and buckled
They have run on the tracks of time
Steam is seeping through their engines
They still have power to push on

The mountains have long since gone
As they pull into the station
For their wounds to be repaired
To continue the fight and the stride
Flacking with rust and neglect
To ride along side by side.

Must we fall blind, must we?
Allow us to grow.
Can we progress, can we?
Only we two know.
Are we children, are we?
No, Just lost for a while.
Will we find each other, will we?
Yes we have, and thank you for that smile.

Painted Face

You paint your eyes and your lips,
Fair lady don’t forget your fingertips.
But have you ever thought of what,
The array of cosmetics that you have got.
From whence they came
And how they were produced,
For your painted face to seduce.
Animal research labs’ for your vanity,
Perform on creatures where you can not see.
The rabbits bright eye
That did sting and smart,
He did not attract anyones heart,
His eyes blink with tears and pain,
If you saw this,
Would you paint your face ever again?

BETTY PACE

When I die
Will I drift
Through space
And time
Will I be born
In another clime
In a strange city
With tall towers
Mid alien flowers.

Or will I be born
In the same place
Down here on earth,
But just in case
By some weird
Accident of birth
I am born
On a different star in space,
Will I still be me
Will I have another face.

Will my memory be gone
When I go whirling
Round another sun,
When I am dust
Floating on the cosmic sea
Will I cease to be
Will I be lost beyond recall
Will I ever know the meaning of it all.

Or will I return
Where I began
Will God and I
And the universe be one?

The Butterfly

A story for Children

David lived in London with his mother who had rec¬ently divorced his father. To make a little extra money, his mother had taken an office job. As this took her away from home for most of the day, her son’s school holidays were a worry to her. Her sister, David’s aunt, realised that his mother was very anxious about leaving him alone all/day while she was away at work. So she solved the problem by having him to stay with her at her cottage in the country.

David was a keen amateur naturalist (it was his best subject at school). He was particularly interested in butterflies. So his stay in the country gave him an excellent opportunity to indulge in his hobby.

One sunny morning he went out into the field behind his aunt’s cottage armed with a butterfly net and a jam jar. For the first hour he had no luck at all. He was feeling very disappointed because he had not seen one butterfly. He was just about to give up and ask his aunt if she wanted anything from the village shop, when he spotted a magnificent blue and white butterfly settled on a foxglove. The moment he tried to catch it it flitted away among the numerous wild flowers growing in the field. David immediately gave chase but the gorgeous butterfuly proved very difficult to trap. It always managed to evade capture because it flew to and fro in a zig-zag path across the net and missed. Eventually he caught it with his cupped hand.

You can imagine his surprise when he opened his fingers and saw he was holding a baby fairy. To make sure it didn’t get away he quickly popped it into the jamjar. He stood for a long time gazing thoughtfully at the little winged creature at the bottom of the glass container.

David was a practical child and like most modern children he did not believe in fairies. His science master had said: “beings such as witches, ghosts, and fairies cannot be proved to exist. Therefore it is safe to assume that they are mere figments of the imagination.” David felt sure he had made a very important scientific discovery. He had found the proof that fairies do in fact exist. He had the evidence in the jam jar! He thought, this will cause a sensation when I produce it at school next term! Books will be written about it and it will be in all the newspapers. In his mind’s eye he could see the headlines: SCHOOLBOY MAKES AMAZING DISCOVERY.

Just then his aunt’s voice broke in on his thoughts. “David, where are you?” He heard his aunt call. “Your lunch is ready.” He wondered what to do with the fairy. He looked around for somewhere to put it, then he saw the garden shed. This seemed a good place to hide the jar. It would not be noticed among the flower pots.

He decided not to mention his discovery to his aunt. He felt sure she would say, “Oh, David, it’s cruel to keep the tiny creature in captivity.” Then she would tell him to take the poor little thing back into the field and let it go. As he had no inten¬tion of parting with his valuable find, he thought it would be wise to keep the matter to himself.

After lunch his friend from the neighbouring farm came. round to ask David if he would like to go for a walk. Paul, who was a year older than David, suggested that they should stroll through the woods near his father’s farm. David agreed, but he was very silent and thoughtful during the walk. This was because he kept thinking about the fairy. At last he could keep his secret no longer.

“What do fairies like to eat?” he blurted out. “What did you say?” queried Paul, who thought he must have misunderstood David’s question. “I thought you asked me what fairies eat.” “I did”, replied David. “I don’t know, as they don’t exist. I expect they live on fresh air. If this is a riddle I give up. You tell me, what do they eat?” “This is a serious question”, exclaimed David. “I caught a fairy this morning. I am worried because I don’t know what to feed it on and I don’t want it to die of starvation.” “Did you catch it at the bottom of your aunt’s garden?” laughed Paul. “No, I didn’t”, said David angrily. “When I caught it, I thought it was a butterfly. Look here, if you don’t believe me, I will show it to you. But you must promise not to tell anyone.” “Alright, I promise,” he grinned. “Where do you keep it? In your pocket?” This remark annoyed David because his friends seemed to be treat¬ing the whole thing as a joke. “You are too stupid to realise that this is a scientific breakthrough. I have the specimen in a glass container in the woodshed, explained David, who was trying to sound imp¬ortant and knowledgeable. “It would not surprise me if I go down in history as the fellow who discovered the first fairy.” “Alright, I believe you, others wouldn’t,” said Paul in good humour. “What have you done with it?” “I told you, it’s in the shed at the back of my aunt’s cottage.”

Meanwhile, the baby fairy was trying desperately to get out of the jam jar. If he could clamber up the side of the jar, he thought he might be able to push the lid off and escape. But the glass proved to be much too slippery. He tried several times, but each time he slid down to the bottom of the jar, where he sat feeling lonely and dejected. Of course, an adult fairy would not have been in this predica¬ment, because he would have known the appropriate words to say which would have got him out of this dangerous situation. As he was only a baby fairy, he had not had time to learn the magic arts. He tried to think how his fairy mother went about casting a spell. He knew she used some special rhyming words. He repeated over and over again all the words he could remember which had some sort of supernatural power, hoping that he might find the right combination.

At last, by sheer luck he recited the formula fairies used to make themselves invisible. He disappeared from view at the very moment David and his friend entered the woodshed. Of course, he was still impris¬oned in the jar but he could not be seen.

David hunted among the flower pots. Eventually he found the jam jar, but to his horror it appeared to be empty. Just to make sure, he unscrewed the lid. This was when the invisible fairy took his opportunity to escape. He flew through the open door and home across the field as fast as he could go.

“Well done, David,” laughed Paul. “It was a good joke, do you know, I almost believed you.”

As David didn’t want to look foolish, he decided to pretend that it was just a practical joke. Neverthe¬less, even when he was grown, he wondered if he really did catch a fairy, or if it was a butterfly after all. But if it was only a butterfly, how did it get out of the jar? He never solved the puzzle.

Questions

With what I’ve written you may not agree
I’m afraid I’ve been too impudent and free,
Perhaps I ought to tone down what I said
To something more conventional instead.
I think the dilemma is clear.
There is merit in saying what I think without fear.
On the other hand, would it be wiser to be insincere?
In a hundred years’ time, they might see the light.
They may even admit that I was right.
Does it matter if posterity understands what I said?
Will this be a consolation to me after I’m dead?

ELAINE SKETCHLEY

Woman, wonderful woman,
You have helped me see
That it’s alright to be me.
Living up to an image
And all that false stuff –
You’ve shown me that
Just being me is enough.

Heart stop!
Heart Stop!

I’m not going to cry.

Heart stop!
Heart stop!

You’re just another guy
Passing by.

Heart stop!
Heart stop!

I’m not going to live a lie.

Heart stop!
Heart stop!

I’m not going to die.
I love me!

I need to dance
I must dance
I want to dance,
Like the river ebbs and flows.

Taking me through my highs and lows
As was foretold in my dream,
My soul skips to the beat of my heart,
A spotlight casts a luminous glow,
Following me wherever I go.

Revealing as I tap
This step quick, this step slow.
My dance as it changes
Never ends, grows, creates new images,
So as I twist, twirl and turn
Allowing myself to dance as I feel,
Accepting, making none of it wrong
As I rock and now reel,
My inner rhythm grows strong.
Should my dance become easy
All my steps would slowly cease,
Time now to take heart
And dance my way to peace.

JO STEVENSON

Bluebells

They bring me bluebells
Armful upon armful
Laid as trophies
At my feet

Vein blue, bone white,
Bells now silent
To the sun
Already droop.

Imprisoned in glass
They stand embalmed
Fitted to share
My tomb.

I sort the washing
Socks from pants
Shirts from tights
Me from you.

Laundry surrounded
The bluebells incline
To understand
My pain.

My Daughter

A sideways smile
loops grinning out
from its secret place
Where the soft carving
Holds perfection.
There she is me
All woman in
This world of man.

Watching my eyes
She laughs
Knowing her power.

One World

The Third World
Exists
They say
On TV screens
In magazines
In photographs
of greed
of guns not
Bread
Showing us
The way
To die
When all sense
Has gone.

When we build
Stores of grain
With lakes of milk
To swim it in.
Too much of it
Is killing us
Too much of it
Is killing them.

When we feed
Cattle here
Better than the
People who die
In glorious
Colour
(Is it their
colour which
lets us watch
them die.
Slowly.
Silent)

We take their
Grain so
We may still
have trips
out to
McDonalds
Or suck the
Blood of a
Sunday roast.
Why should we
forego
The pleasure
Of that
When the rattle
Of collecting tins
Can embalm our
Conscience and
Stop our ears
To the sound
Of death.

No. No.
We needn’t change
The Third World
Is a long way off
Not part
Of ours
At all.

My gaolers are kind
Their voices soft, caressing.
Held in bondage to
Insistent arms
I bear their kisses
Their love
Unresisting.

My gaol is pretty
Floors with carpet
(Locks of steel
on my heart)
Roses round the door.
(My soul bolted
and barred
No Entry).

Their smiles hypnotise
Echoing chasms of
Dark. Tunnels of sound.
I watch their lips
See the blood glint
On their teeth.
It is mine.

And so I said
OK
fie’ ll get a roam, a flat, a house
but I’ve done all this
before and
learned that I don’t like
to wash the socks
dirtied by other feet than mine
for sort the shit-stained pants
from sweaty shirts
nor keep the house
nor have the kids

And you said
OK
Fine
I’ll do my share
You won’t know I’m there
half the time

But what you meant was
You bear my children
bare your arse
clean my house
and cook my meals
while I’m out
half the time
doing work
the proper kind
the sort that you
get money for.

And so it seems that once again
I sold myself
But what I feel is rage
for loss of owning
my right to ‘have’
No space, no room
Nothing now is mine
You have your job
A workshop full of things
of yours alone.

But me
What’s left for me
to even start to call MY own?
Not even that between my legs
distillment of what
makes me, ME
now is just another empty space
waiting there
for you to fill.

Another Mask

Am I beautiful? Am I?

Wrap it in paper
and send it to people
too weak to keep living.
They can live on it –
just for today.

Am I beautiful? Am I?

No need to listen
to words pouring out
from my heart
of my soul
just watch my full lips
form the sounds

Am I beautiful? Am I?

Keep me cast down
in dungeons of
fashion and photos
and farce where models
are nameless as cars.

Am I beautiful? Am I?

A trophy am I
to be well stuffed
and mounted
on your altar bed
then hung round your neck
like a charm

Am I beautiful? Am I?

Is it light in my eyes
Or reflections
of you
that keeps your gaze
fast to my face?

Yes – I am beautiful I am
Not where you see it
but hidden far out
well away from the taint
of your dirtying grasp
Even rape cannot reach me
Not here.

Unwilling I grew you
A cold frame to
Your burgeoning.

All high flyers
Will be shot down
In pain
Again. And again
And again
And again.

It’s taken quite
a while
for you to grow
big enough
to break this glass
And force the warmth
of the sun
Deep into this
cold frame
of mine.

I lie
The snake coiled
Poised to strike
So watch your ankles
If you think
That you can fit
Inside my pit
With me.

“I’m not good enough”.
“For who?” They said
“For who?”
“For you” – I cried.
“For us?” they sighed.
“Not us. We don’t judge.
Be not good enough
For you. Not us”.
So I’m not.

The Innocent

Each one of us has our own special season of the year. A time when the scents and sights send us hurtling back in time with multi-coloured glimpses of long forgotten memories along the way.

For some it’s the white, crisp silence of snow-laden Christmases; frost filled windows of lace; dragon’s breath in the morning air; muffins and hot buttered crumpets for warmth.

For others it’s autumn with leaves on fire, red apples and fields of corn gleaned and gathered in haste with an eye to the sky all the day; poppies blazing and berries beckoning fron the hedgerow.

Or spring with the promise of sunnier days in the first dashes of colour pushing from the dead earth.

But my time is summer. Those first scent filled blossom laden two weeks. June bursting into full glory yet with hints of autumn already in the tight green buds of apples-to-be and little green gooseberries of new chestnuts.

It was then, in those heady full weeks of June, so full of beauty and life, more years ago now than I care to count, that I lost my innocence.

My mother had, she considered, married ‘well’ – eventually. How she had striven for respectability; to loose her Irish peasant origins first by placing herself in Service and Servitude to the English upper classes and then, having got their manners and mannerisims by heart, by a second marriage to a fading impoverished example of the aristocracy. A man of merit but no money, of manners but no steel. Sometimes I wondered if my mother’s blood was liquid steel.

Life had started to be good to her. Life in Ireland had been harsh, life in England not much better with an illegitimate child followed by a failed marriage. But now, at 40, she had finished producing children, had enough money and a house to be proud of.

The house had been bought during the War – evidence of my father’s Golden Handshake from British Rail. A forced early retirement due to that other war when men rotted away entrenched in a foreign country. Some might think that Wartime England was hardly the time for property speculation – and near London too! But they couldn’t resist the bargain they discovered at the foot of Harrow’s famous Hill. Living so near ‘The School’ with echoes of Winston Churchill still ringing loud, lent an air of grandeur it might otherwise have lacked – and satisfied my mother’s craving not to be thought of as Common. A Mortal Sin!

The house could have been Victorian, more probably Edwardian – full of beautiful fireplaces and tiles; alcoves and panelling. The front room and fireplace were pure Adam, all bows and frills and loops with a dragon flying across the canopy. A huge brass fender smouldered with the flames from the fire – reflecting in the long, long fire irons tucked alongside. But having a fire lit in my own room years later, was the ultimate treat. How many children can now lie in bed on a dark winter’s night watching the flames make dancing shadows on the wall from your own coal fire? I would lie, covers pulled up to my nose, and imagine myself in a tent out on a wild prairie, alone in the world. A survivor.

While the house was quite beautiful, perhaps it was the garden I loved the best. Rose covered archways punctuated the raked gravel paths; a pergola framed the wide brass-stepped French windows. Lillies of the valley and spikey blue iris rampaged unchecked beneath the apple trees surrounding the lawn. Well, that’s how it stays in my memory though in later years my father’s illness and lack of funds reduced its glory to a weed infested slum. But I loved it even then, giving me as it did, shelter from the bitterness and the anger of the house.

Still, in those days, with rationing and the War very much at the forefront of everyone’s mind it was glorious. A haven. A retreat. And pension permitting, there seemed to be no reason for this idyll to end. Alas for the best laid plans…

It may have been a too careless celebration of her 40th birthday which nine months later produced myself. The horror and the rage with which my birth was greeted still rings in my ears. To have a baby at all was bad enough but to have given birth to yet another girl was a catastrophe.

Taking shelter in illness – real or imagined – my mother hid from the world for six long months during one of the coldest winters on record. During all that time it would seem, she neither saw nor spoke to my father. Or if she did, it was merely to pass comment on the weather. She lived in self-imposed exile in the upstairs of the house – prov¬identially provided with a kitchen – while my father ranged desolate and alone below.

At the age of 54 he didn’t find the joys of fatherhood easy to plumb yet again. Nor was his health any the better for such an upheaval. His heart, always weak from trench fever, now grew so frail and he frail around it. He was small and fine. His hair now snow white, his shoulders hunched as if to keep out the cold. Yet for all that, somewhere from within his very being he found love which wrapped me and kept me safe as I grew. For him I had no sin to forgive, save being born too late. But for my mother, my sins could never be forgiven.

She had thought herself finally redeemed from her earlier failings and to see herself once again viewed with a nudge and a wink – still a woman of flesh — in the eyes of her Roman Catholic contemporaries, was a desperate humiliation.

She rallied however, but a close air of prudishness and puritanism now pervaded the house which had once been the scene of parties and ‘high jinks’ as she called them. Quite what these ‘high jinks’ entailed was never revealed, but it seems I missed a golden age just by the skin of my teeth.

Shame had come into their lives. Their health deteriorated and my mother’s asthma became as chronic a condition as my father’s weak heart. Often I would lie in bed at night listening to my mother’s wheezes, praying that they wouldn’t stop. For all her anger and bitterness we loved each other. I always understood her, though she would betray my caring again and again; always full of remorse when she saw the damage she caused.

I slept in the same room as my mother of necessity – my father having been banished to the one spare room, there to sleep alone until he died, too soon. It was his room which became my own, much loved retreat, in later years.

To assauge her guilt and fear of Hell-fire, my mother became ever more indented to the Church. She heard Mass daily with evening Benediction taken in on Sunday as well. My father, an unwilling convert, could escape Benediction and would have hot toast laden with salty dripping waiting for us when we got home. The wireless would be on with Gilbert and Sullivan lilting out or Jane Eyre being read. The fear of being locked in a cupboard haunted me for years after.

But in Church, on those summer evenings, I sat lost in the beauty of the Latin, the incense, the hymns the colour. Totally devout and sure that I too could be a saint if I could only have a bed of bricks like Rose of Lima or suffer martyrs death like Saint Cecilia – my Patron Saint.

There we would sit, my mother and myself in ‘our’ pew at the back of the Church, watching the sun set through stained glass – watching the rainbows playing on the floor. The strength of my mother tangible through her best astrakan coat.

Each June, as the flower borders reached peaks of perfection and splendour, the cull took place. My father, shirt-sleeved and collarless armed with secateurs and my mother in gardening dress and pinny, clutching the kitchen scissors, would start casting a quizzical eye over the blooms – shearing, snipping and teasing out the very best. For the Parish Priest had appointed us “Flower Suppliers in Chief” to the annual First Holy Communion. Each year I watched with awe as armful upon armful of heady, vivid blooms were cut, watered and transported by anything on wheels up to the school hall where the Communion Breakfast would take place. Some decorated the Church, some the Hall – some even flowed out in vases on to the playground as a backdrop for the photographs.

Looking back I see that it could not have been just our flowers which transformed the bare school hall and the altar, but then I was convinced we had the duty and responsibility of providing the setting for this day of perfection.

Those flowers! Those flowers! I see them now. Towering delphiniums with bees still buzzing in the blooms; pink and yellow lupins; heady philadelphus – Oh! the scent of that philadelphus – gypsophelia; asparagus fern, paeonies, poppies, lilies, roses by the dozen – and anything else which didn’t duck its head in time.

It would be in the evening before the big day that most of the flowers were gathered. They then found themselves plunged neck-deep in long enamel jugs of cold water to stand as sacrificial offerings overnight in the chill of the creaking greenhouse. We worked till dusk and by first light were up again – my father now painstakingly selecting the most perf¬ect of his roses. These would be ranged in little bowls down the entire length of the Breakfast Table itself. Should the dew not have done its job prope¬rly, the roses found their heads immersed in a large bowl of cold water or run under the tap for a few seconds then given a slight shake, so that a few dewdrops stood proudly upon their velvet petals.

Soon all the flowers would be trundled up to the Church where the ladies of the Altar Society stood anxiously waiting for our floral tribute to the Great Day. As I grew older, I was allowed to help fetching and carrying. The arranging was left to those deft enough to produce a work of art with a few leaves and a rose.

Naturally, in the course of time, it was my own Big Day. I was to make my own First Holy Commu¬nion. Usually a tomboy in patched trousers and mud, I stood a picture of six year old virginal innocence, shining clean, neat and tidy. Photos show my eyes tight shut against the sun, huge white teeth in a devastating ear to ear grin – most unholy – a long white veil restraining my mane of waist length curling blonde hair, a neat white dress to just below the knee not long and common, nor shiny satin like poor Geraldine Keen whose mother didn’t belong to the Co-op and so couldn’t afford such luxuries. My knees clung together in their usual fashion and my feet neatly pointed forwards, each sock the same height and my shoes unscuffed. These are the only photographs ever taken of me where I look positively decorous – no hint of wild Irish gypsy usually only too apparent in later years. My hair grew black as I grew older, though now the grey is fading in. But then I could almost have been the cool English beauty for which my dark Irish mother craved!

I made my first Holy Communion clutching the special white prayerbook with which my father had surprised me on the way to the Church. Its cover was hard and shiny with a holy picture on the front, and inside, written in my father’s perfect copper-plate “Love from Mummy and Daddy on your Special Day”.

But sadly I remember none of it. None of the actual ceremony. It all flashed past in a dream of incense, lights, flowers (our flowers) and row upon row of white-clad children with piety so real I could have touched it. Then we were outside, the sun blaring down and photographs with ‘Smile Please’ and just as suddenly we were inside again, sitting at the long, long table where we were to breakfast. All of us in white, even the boys. Encircling us were our parents, doting and smiling as they primly balanced plates of sandwiches on their knees. My mother looked as proud as the rest.

The table was quite grand in its snowy cloth with the bowls of roses marching right the way down its centre, the dew – or tap-water – still glistening on their petals. I grinned across at my father.

But it was then that I noticed the greenfly. One of the most perfect white roses was a mass of greenfly. You couldn’t help but see as they crawled from the stem out on to the bloom. A few of the other children noticed too and started to snigger. I pretended I hadn’t seen.

I was still dreamily wading through the jelly and ice-cream – strange food for breakfast I was thinking – when the Parish Priest, obviously having better things to do, suddenly jumped to his feet and proceeded to say ‘Grace’.

Now I had been strictly brought up and had always been taught that ‘Grace’ was said only when the meal was well and truly finished. And I had quite a way still to go – as had everyone else. But they followed their leader and jumped to their feet, eager to please and obey. I was puzzled. How could I say Grace when my meal wasn’t over? Should I say it now, and having finished, say it again? I was still debating this dilemma when our parents too abandoned their sandwiches and stood.

I decided to remain where I was, cramming as much into my mouth as fast as I was able. Ignoring frantic signals from my teachers, I sat it out, feeling that they obviously didn’t understand that yes, I would say Grace, but when I had finished.

Slowly a nervous giggle from my classmates took hold, sending ripples up and down the table. It spread to the teachers – even the Priest and to our parents. Hysteria broke out. Wave upon wave of laughter shook their bodies, making them cry and their shoulders heave. I watched their ugly gaping mouths – watched their eyes fixed on this child who didn’t understand, who didn’t know the rules. I watched their delight in my discomfort. I turned to my mother for help but her mouth too was just a gash of scarlet – she had joined the rest.

Only my father’s face remained impassive – he gently motioned me to rise, his eyes glinting though not with tears of laughter I fancy.

Slowly I got up and the laughter subsided. We said the prayer and the Priest, his duties discharged, disappeared. We sat down again to finish our meal. No-one spoke to me and I kept my head well down so no-one could see the tears. But a stone formed in my heart that day as I sat watching greenfly crawl down on to the tablecloth. It froze my belief in a Catholic God of Love who could so humiliate me on this, my Day of All Days.

Nothing else since has ever stripped me quite so bare as on that day. The day I lost my innocence.

SARAH WRIGHT

Bureaucracy

Here we sit
on benches in your cream-painted corridors,
endlessly waiting.

Doors open and close,
elegant hushed voices
in hushed echoes
travel along iron-bound stairways
across vast areas of room.

Sensible rubber-heeled shoes
squeak across polished floors;
their directions sure and predetermined.

Sometimes a rattle of keys,
as a mysterious door marked “Private”
opens, and is closed again.

Behind locked doors,
you hold the secrets to our lives,
neatly filed away,
pigeon-holed, that’s us,
crammed together into metal drawers,
ready to be taken out
and glared at by some
supercilious civil-servant.

In the end,
they “serve” only their own cause:
a well-heeled profession,
a hypocritical facade;
“We like meeting people”,
they say.

Not us though.
They don’t like meeting us,
the real thing.
We are a problem to them;
our lives have fallen about our ears,
we sit within the ragged cloak of it,
limply waiting.

Sometimes we feel we could wait here all day
and all night. Early next morning
perhaps someone might say
“What? Still here? I thought I’d
told you, wrong department,
we can’t help you here”.

Yes,
you hold
the keys to the Kingdom.

Oh, and
that they might ever be in the
same hands
do go on
eternally
helping us to be

helpless.

Hero

Be your own hero
follow your own star
For only you know
who you are

The Daily Dilemma

Somewhere in my wardrobe
I am lurking,
waiting to be found.

I check myself constantly in the mirror:
(I do, then, exist);
however my existence
appearing each time so obsequiously
before me in that mirror
is merely a clue
to the inner self.

Question: am I still locked away
in a shop window,
in a side street as yet undiscovered: or,
have I, by chance,
unwittingly
discarded myself

along with antique garments; screwed-up,
bundled away,
in a brown

carrier bag?

On My Own Birth

I burst like angry stars
upon my parent’s world:
I glimmered like a malevolent
little flame through infancy;

my adolescence
boomed
like a forest fire
on their horizon:
I slashed at my soul with razors
(and theirs);

I cast bloody handprints
on the white innocence
of their enterprise:

Sparking out,
I reached for heaven, but
(bang, bang,
they shot me down) ….

yet now I glower,
bonfire – bright,
little flower
of their night ….

Spring Clean

A lifetime’s clutter
accommodates every corner of my mind;
I wish to clear it all out, like an old cupboard,
clear it all out!

Rake out the old
memories, the petty feuds,
the damaging hurts
and scars of other times ….

I wish
the cupboard was bare,
scrubbed white,
bleached as an old bone
left out in all weathers ….

A fresh start!
To sit alone
in a white-washed cell:

Sunlit;

rainwashed;

sea-scaped;

at peace.

Property and Profit

The turf is brown
and down-trodden
on the Race Hill.

From this window I can see
the scenery of the changing season.
The wind-blown grass, the chalk-tracks;
sun and shadow, skies
of grey and blue, the seagulls’ cries
as they swoop and scream,
settle in swarms, and
break again ….

Grey smoke curls from chimneys:
a man and dog,
children tumbling downhill
through rough tufts,
dips and hollows; it’s
a home scene to me
but you see
they’re
pulling the houses down
and soon we’ll be moved
to the other side of town:

and here, where the dear
old houses were
there’ll be
ugly white blocks,
or red; it’s all the same;

the community
will be gone in all but name.

The Homecoming

“The Palace of Fun”,
dismal in the rain;
home again.

Steely grey sea,
mists; gulls flying around

the seedy old town
(decaying in splendour):

home of actors
and villians,
students;
unmarried mothers,
eccentric
old ladies:

bed-sitter land;

Regency balconies
peeling in the salty wind,
gracious arcades ….

Sometimes I wander through these old
streets
in my mind,

savouring
the aged glories
of another time …