I go back there sometimes

for coffee and to see some

old familiar faces from

first school days,

~

older sporting foes too,

to relive closely fought

local derby games,

~

but secretly it’s the places

that truly take me back,

some unchanged sixty

years or more,

~

forgotten benches knee

deep in nettles no longer

cradle young lovers’ trysts,

~

sandstone walls once so

easily carved with initials

of now long-dead friends,

~

wild woods and quarries

now manicured into safe

sculpted pocket parks,

~

we walk gingerly

a group that was a gang,

memories tumble forth

like spilt coins which are

swiftly caught with

winsome smiles,

~

they’ll all die there,

laid down with their kin

quietly on the edge of town

me, I’ll be scattered

in my secret places,

invisible, finally at rest

back home

*

© Graham R Sherwood 1/25