Our Past, Times Mirror
Miracle Man
10/26/2024
When we look into time’s mirror,
we behold only our past.
Both pleasing and unhappy,
that during life we’ve cast.
Our past is totally ours,
and our protected read only file.
Memory cause some to grimace,
to others it brings a smile.
We make no attempt to alter,
the things found archived here.
It’s like a book containing pages,
some, our memory might dog ear.
While others know many things,
from vibes that we might send.
Until death locks our memory,
only then will it see its end.
In every life there’s dysphoric things we Can’t forget
and also things we cherish and remember.
Tom
CANDLES&NIGHTLIGHTS
Candles and nightlights flickering bright,
blackout curtains shutting out the moonlight.
Snuggle down cosy with blankets tight,
perhaps the war will end to-night.
Dripping setting from Sunday's roast,
spread so thick on Monday's toast.
Meat bones simmer on the old gas ring,
Pa's homemade soup,the 'real thing'.
Paper chains cut and glued,
beer in glass bottles brewed.
Christmas puddings with threepenny bits,
the Meccano present made to fit.
Sunday school outings upto Coombe hill,
my first ever train ride,so quite a thrill.
Walks over corn fields to the Bugle Horn,
crisps and lemonade upon their lawn.
A weekly soak in a round tin bath,
towelling off by a fire in the hearth
Reading
Begins with Rupert Bear,
Until that was found too square;
The Just William came on the scene,
But soon became a childish has-been.
Youth-filled reading,a melanged mix,
Biggles & squadron,sixty-six;
The hero,Algy & Ginger against the hun,
Adventures that made him number one.
Onto Enid's Famous Five,
Long before PC, could deprive;
Julian,Anne George & Rick
In books,fast moving and slick
RITES OF PASSAGE
Each Christmas we all gathered there,
‘Aunt Clare, has more room ,after all’ with
her trestled tables and chair.
Grown-ups swigging their brown bottled ale,
young-uns, lemonade with paper straw,
VE style parties, once more.
Lunch over, the voice decibels rose,
raucus laughter oiled by the beer
brought forth more plates of festive cheer.
Cards slid noiselessly over the American
cloth, copper coins switching from pot to pot,
enthralled children watching on, ‘til
banished with a special treat, to the cold
stairs, or now bare front room, or to play
out in the deserted twilight street.
Every year the ritual was much the same,
a family ‘bring and share’ , long before
such gatherings were given this name
THE HACK
Out of the yard,my daughter and me,on a hot
summer day of Eighty-three.Hastoe to Cadsden,
there and back,eight hours in the saddle,for our
first all-day hack.Onto the canter path,down to
Paines End,through Fox Lane the route did wend.
Into a copse ,keeping the pace to an even flow.
Up to Dunsmore,past the Black Horse, we followed
the course.Chequers, Pondswood,down hill to the pub.
Horses tethered for a rest,we ate our ploughmans with
a pint of the landlord's best.Back in the into the saddle,
at the canter to retrace our steps and in Hastoe as the
clock struck four,to stack the tack on the stable door
Golf is
a 'umbling game
It's all in the mind,just
One swing away from a problem
hiding.
A CRICKET vignette
mid-summer,evening league cricket.
Fifty years fade from view
they’ve labelled it
Twenty-Twenty & think
of it as something new.
T20 is its new name
a fast action cricket game
Now, has world-wide acclaim-
An evening sport of my youth
Re-packaged..in truth ..long -in-the-tooth
NOTE:Twenty overs a side cricket,under lights, is set to rival soccer as a
spectator sport,was played in the early 'f'ifties as an amateur evening
league after work,lasting approx two hours,in May thru July before the evening light faded.Nothing new under the sun,except for marketing men! Watch out this could become as popular as baseball.
A football *memory
Just like this sport I am very old
so if I may be so bold
this memory I'll unfold
each day,when school was out
off to a green,hereabout-
the teams often numbered seventeen!
with our jumpers as posts,
no boots ,referee or
coaches ,you'd see
back and forth we'd be
'til tired out,and ready for tea
*you call it soccer over the pond
TRAIN SPOTTING
Clutching sandwiches, pencil and pop
we awaited the eight forty-five,tickets
in hand;we scrambled aboard the
LMS, carriage, with engine and van;
from the High Street, ‘ere long smoke
billowed over the vale ,as we chugged along
Non stop, five miles the grimy coach rocked
and swayed. ’All change, All change’ loudly,
the Station-master barked out his refrain,
we trainspotting lads so quickly de-trained,
all day to remain; Crossing, noting and
recording each London-bound train.
Five stones
closing times
radiograms and
seventy-eights
school caps
sticklebacks
saturday flicks,pooh sticks
Charabancs
steam trains
linoleum
oil cloth
mangles
fish paste
sandwich spread
Hot towel shaves
cut-throat razor
shopping baskets
paper bags
braces,plimsoles
short,back
and sides
Wizard beano
and hotspur
lending libraries
picturegoer,
road to
Bridget Bardot
Marilyn Monroe
Dripping
coal fires
antimacassars
nylons,suspenders
crumpets
and toast
Brown and mild
barrelled beer
conkers,school milk
blackboard rubbers
and liftup desk lids
times-tabled
school-kids
Draughts
and allotments
rusty bikes
roller skates
satchels and scrumping
pounds,shillings
and pence
Some love fast cars and planes,
Buses,tractors or trains-
In the saddle,the place to be,
One horse-power,sits well with me.
| Year Posted 2010
We try to relive them, we try to forget them
Past times have shaped today, some we have defied
Some have died in unopened pages, others live on in folklore
They never go away, no matter how fast the future comes along
The past times are not past, they always tag along
Sat and watched some nostalgia today,
All about Salfords death and decay.
Sad to see but it had to be slain
It had to come down to rise up again,
But the way it was done was all in vain.
New houses for old was the alluring cry,
No one noticed the neighborhood die.
People packed up their world in a moving van,
And that's when the exodus first began.
It rolled across the district like a tidal wave.
The folk banded together for one last wake.
Street parties abounded to give the kids cake.
Folk stood at front doors, arms across chests,
They said, well, he didn't have much that's for sure,
Next doors gone so where's me coat and hat,
Suppose I 'll go check out that high rise flat.
Our turn tomorrow, demolition starts day after,
Our history crushed to rubble, what a disaster.
The neighborhoods gone never again to arise.
I've watched them all go with tears in their eyes.
We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when.
The life we had shared, taken with the stroke of a pen.
© Dave Timperley. Easter Sunday, 2018
Past times have come,
they lurk within the darkness,
as I sit here fighting to continue on with my journey,
tears roll down my face thinking of....
the things that no longer exist.
Lost a Tia to death by drugs, a mother to abusive men and drugs,
a father to child molestation, a grandmother because I had a kid at fifteen.
I can't tell you how many times as a child I was abused,
how many schools and homes that I have been in.
No family support, so I do this on my own,
All I got is my pen and paper and that's all I need.
No tears can come for there is no emotions in my life.
Foster care for five years, two kids by the age of 17,
both wound up in homes with adopted parents,
How was I to raise them with no one on my side to help,
Family hates me, because I chose life over murder.
I don't understand how people can be that way yet claim to be Christians.
I worship my Father on High and sing praises to all.
Past times have come but now its time for me to defeat them once and for all
by using the power of God.
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