Village Childhood

He was the village blacksmith To us children he was known As our adopted Uncle Wilf They’d no children of their own. Six days a week he worked, His hours long and physically hard. Our cottage back door opened Straight onto the smithy yard. The yard was full of machinery Each one a potential toy, Schooner, stagecoach, tank Imagined by a lonely little boy. A binder, a reaper, a hay rake A seed drill, a harrow, a plough I never saw them arrive and go They just came and went somehow. Sometimes there were farmers Serious, big weathered men. Talking quietly in the Forge Maybe laughing now and then. I stood there among them, Old Tom’s youngest lad, They all knew and respected My hard working labourer dad. Uncle Wilf talked as he worked, Never had much time to stop, Always work to be done In a busy blacksmith’s shop. Sometime he’d let me help him, Giving me a little job to do, Like handing him the nails to be Driven into a Shire’s new shoe. Just a country childhood Just after the Second War And binders, harrows and reapers Weren’t so much needed anymore. The big Combined Harvester Very quickly came along And, not long after, the Shires And village smithies were all gone. Now, seventy years later, Eyes closed, I recall with joy My very special childhood as A lonely Yorkshire village boy. Life seemed to be a lot slower And people didn’t have a lot But we’d really appreciated The little bits we’d all got.