Two Poems

For fathers day John received a membership for a family tree website, which brought to mind some poems from his book of poetry. Johns poetry book is held by the British Poetry Library in London and is available on Amazon

Portrait in Sepia

 

He belongs to the world of D.H Lawrence

One of the sons and lovers of that age

And his coat is stiff with the history

Of Sunday best and that formal life

When milk was delivered by horse and cart

And the oil lamp’s glow at night

Was  the light by which a generation

Sweated the price of tomorrow’s affluence.

 

Though decimated by the carnage

Of a war, they battled to rid their progeny

Of the burden of yesterday’s coal fed

Revolution and fought for the right to walk the hills

Where the curlews swoop and cry.

 

LIGHT

 

My grandfather’s Davy lamp sits on my desk;

The small flickering light by which he won the coal

In the years before the dust got him.

 

He was my first death; motionless on his marriage bed;

Must say goodbye to your granddad, they pressed me

Though when I submitted no one I knew was there

 

He lives beside me in this ancient lamp with

His number engraved on the base.  I pick it up

And feel the weight of it

 

……the years.