REACHING NEW HEIGHTS

The name Scrabo derives from the Irish screabach meaning thinly covered rock or rough stony land. It was anglicized as Scrabock in the 16th century. Screabach is also the Irish name of Scrabo townland, in which the hill stands.

SCRABO

Two teenagers, we were on holiday.

Term ended, free as birds, we slipped away.

just kids in love: on impulse, we set out

to climb to Scrabo Tower for the view.

We walked till we were tired, so you could shout

and, from that hilltop, like a glider, flew

your lovely voice which, that day, seemed divine.

On that high hill you sang your name and mine.

SPECIAL DELIVERY

Another Sonnet-style poem, in that it's 14 lines and concludes with a rhyming couplet. It's not autobiographical. Often I like to use the 'poetic voice' in much the same way as an actor might 'inhabit' the character that he or she is playing to deliver a poem based largely on imagination.

LETTER

The letter that arrived today was brief:

its message, neatly written, was concise.

The cold words, terse and factual, brought grief.

It had been redirected once or twice

for I have changed addresses as I’ve fled

my former life, attempting to forget

the angry ghosts of us, to seek, instead,

a place where I’d no longer be beset

by self-reproach, the pain of the divorce,

where I could start again, slough off the past

but, as I read the leaden words, remorse

burned through me and a self-disgust amassed

as I imagine tumours might expand

beneath the rib-cage, leaving me unmanned.

IN THE BEGINNING

First day at school, first day at work, both were unnerving experiences, both were so very long ago.

FIRST DAY

That first day, in a new-bought suit, afraid

to speak up for myself, I sat, with pen

and pencil that I’d sharpened with a blade,

in a large office with a group of men.

Next door there was a busy typing pool

of women. This was different from school.

At work that day, a green, self-conscious lad,

I joined a world of grown-ups. It felt strange

to mix with men the same age as my dad,

and be, myself, a grown-up for a change.

At sixteen, I thought I’d be there for life,

rise through the ranks, earn money, get a wife.

In fact, things turned out otherwise, of course:

I grew up fast, changed jobs, acquired a spouse,

a car, a mortgage, offspring, then divorce

and, through the years, I moved from house to house

and job to job, from pen to keyboard, till

at sixty-three I’d really had my fill.

Back in that lofty office, long ago:

who was I, the glum youngster, just sixteen, 

that listened as the jokes flew to and fro

and felt somehow excluded from the scene?

I recognise that lad out on a limb

and feel a certain tenderness for him.

For verse of a different kind, why not visit: https://www.facebook.com/richard.fleming.92102564/

DOUBLE TROUBLE

It happened almost every year, when the school photograph was taken, that some young rascal, who'd been positioned at the end of a row, darted round the back to the other end of the assembly as the camera slowly panned across to capture the images of several hundred boys, thus ensuring that he appeared twice when the photograph was printed. 

It generally occurred because of a dare, although quite often it was just for the sheer fun of it. The consequence of such tomfoolery was usually a sound thrashing, back in those good old days when such things were not just acceptable but expected.  

TWICE

In childhood, briefly, there were two of me.

The day the old man with the camera came

and we, the schoolboys, in five platform rows,

sat while the panoramic camera froze 

our image, slowly panning round. My name

was mud when father learned I’d run

from one end to the other just for fun

and in the picture, at both ends, was me.