You can read my poem “We Passed Over the Sky” here:
https://www.themilkhouse.org/we-passed-over-the-sky-by-katherine-shirley/
You can read my poem “We Passed Over the Sky” here:
https://www.themilkhouse.org/we-passed-over-the-sky-by-katherine-shirley/
Looking up the ancestors
Tracing a family tree
Am I in search of them, my love
Or really in search of me?
Finding pairs of twins who married
Sailed off across the pond
Only to find in a generation
Home was what they’d scorned
Trying to cram onto scraps of paper
Names and dates and more
Wondering why they had chosen to scatter
Themselves from shore to shore
Picking over the bones of stories
Scraps of my family lore
Wishing I’d asked before someone passed
A couple of questions more
Chuckling over the old intrepid
Tales of derring done
The girl who ran guns in place of her brothers
As they’d only blab to mum
The lady highwayman; army driver;
Girl of a thousand smiles
The one whose paintings went down with the ship
The ones who ran quite wild
How would I fit, these elderly legends
How would I measure up?
Putting myself into clogs and sabots
Filling old boots with luck
Knowing the secrets that spring from boxes
Hidden on dusty shelves
Of births and deaths and marriage and proxies
Chicken-scratch bibles and tombstone kells
The hideous source of a score of quarrels
Love letters from the wrong side of a war
Black sheep and politics; actors and brothels,
Family heirlooms and so much more
Mystery facts are now uncovered
A lady who lied for years
Pretending to youth and no old lovers
To soothe a new husband’s fears
Learning why some names were missing records
During a time of strife
Who had migrated and waited and waited
For news of their family’s life
Postcards and poems and brochures and programmes
From concert and theatre and prom
Knicknacks and geegaws and troubles and trinkets
Collections they handed down
Sepia prints and chemical glass
My ancient faces scowl
Melancholic in rented clothes
They are caught dead in now
We care more for ancient ruins
And destruction wrought on tombs
By whatever means they may
Than for lives that end today
While the blood and flesh and bone
Leaving everything they own
To escape the latest purge
Travel desert, sea and gorge
Those who voyage only land
On their uppers, close at hand
To the help they sorely need
Yet the politicians plead
Not to have to break their word
To the xenophobic horde
Those whose votes they barely won
From the hardened right, anon
Thus with bottle-necks and fence
We corral and harry hence
Workers that we sure could use
Grateful, welcome, unabused
Skilled and keen to integrate
To prop up our ageing State
In permissive company
Knowing just who let them be
As the fight takes to the skies
And the waves fill up with lies
We would throw away resource
Inconvenient and coarse
With no tally of the cost
Nor of what support is lost
Though our leaders might feel tall
While our borders stand, we fall
They’re closing the borders
And checking for crime
We’ve signalled our orders –
Each kiosk; its sign
For twenty-one days
On the honour of those
Running far from the virus
No quarantine slows
Here’s the health of a nation
Held palmed in your hand
Shaking; quaking relations
That no one can stand
Find they’re no longer welcome
While terror’s abroad
Though the shape of their income
Is what we applaud
It’s a risk to our public
Unhealthy and pale
No banana republic
With goodies for sale
Will be bribing their way
Past the guards on the line
Who know only to say
“Gosh, yes, everything’s fine!”
Though you’re likely to bring
Things that may cost the Earth
Still we can’t let you in
More than our job is worth
As the siren is sounded
The gates clang at last
All asylum for hounded
A thing of the past
We suspect you of sheltering
Dangerous germs
So we’ll lock down the sweltering
Under our terms
No sex, please, we’re British
The same goes for fun
And in case you seem skittish
I’m holding this gun
With no end of compassion
Our hearts on our sleeve
We’ve resources to ration
So, kindly, just leave.
I love to watch the lights flash by
Travelling from town to town
Throughout the inky, velvet night
They lift me when I’m down.
And following their smoky chains
As far as the eye can see
I am quite grateful for their pains
To light the way for me.
When John went to Euston with Rita
(As from her train, he’d sworn to meet her)
He found it quite hard to tell from the card
Which platform from which he should greet her.
So John asked a guard or a porter
How he could find out where he ought-a
Be meeting his pal, as it wasn’t long now
And her temper was fast growing shorter.
To John’s great dismay though, this tactic
Backfired almost like elastic
He was sent to the end far away from his friend,
And missed her, which made her quite irate really.
Why do we at break of day
Brace ourselves to plow the fray?
Surely Britons ain’t forgot
That queueing is our national sport?
Daily, though, I feel the thrill
Of elbows meeting ribs until
Inside and out, I’m black and blue
And panting and perspiring too.
There must be a better way
For me to get to work today,
But tube is quicker, you retort
We like to keep our journeys short!
Yet overcrowding and delays
Especially on ‘weather’ days
Are making this commuter frown
Each time she travels into town.
Daydreaming across continents,
Seeking the soothing sight
Of lights blinking in the distance,
Leading me through the night.
A girl got on a train, tra la!
She soon would go insane, tra la!
For service there was none,
And tickets bought for fun.
The girl sat down to wait, tra la!
Hoping she’d not be late, tra la!
But vain were all her hopes,
For Virgin trains are jokes.
The girl was on her knees, tra la!
A bunch of tourists teased, tra la!
Not knowing she could speak
Their lingo, tongue in cheek.
The girl was far too tired, tra la!
So she just sat and smiled, tra la!
And tried to read her book
While Europe cocked a snook.
The girl was now ashamed, tra la!
Of people not so strange, tra la!
She felt she ought to speak;
Too tired, bit her cheek.
The girl wanted her bed, tra la!
To hell with all things red, tra la!
But this was not her night.
The tannoy put her right.
The girl was now pissed off, tra la!
At snotty woman’s cough, tra la!
But trained to be polite,
She kept her mouth shut tight.
The girl got on a train, tra la!
To take her home again, tra la!
She needs a good night’s sleep.
To help her through the week.
My sometime love for hearth and home
Lies not by fire, nor yet with those
Acquaintance of my passing day
For things material fade to grey
And colour-leeched, do turn to dust
They in my plains of mem’ry rust.
But lusty, strong, my heart does beat,
Not gazing ‘pon familiar street,
No haunt it loves, no buildings stir
My choosy organ, yet I fear,
That trav’ling through a countryside
All brown and barren, far and wide
Doth wake in me a tender gleam
For skies of grey and fields of green.
As seen from windows of a train,
My mind’s eye flashes ‘pon the rain
And ‘midst the warmth of climes more sunny
Tho’ yes – I also find it funny
Born not of humour, more of pain
I wish to be back home again.