Robert Verdon, #326, Ten Pound Pom
the hat flicked off
my head
and flew over the
Red Sea
which wasn’t red
the hat was red
I still remember, it
was 1958
the Fair Sky was
unfair that day
it’d be
waiting for us there
in Australia, said
Dad
and my mother nodded
after that, we went
to Yemen
then called ‛Aden’
and poorer than home
— no doubt poorer
still today —
the smiling young
man in bare feet
on the scorching
road
was from Kenya I
think and
he and Dad spoke in
Swahili
(Dad was there in the war)
till we found a dark
shop with stuffed toys
hanging over the
door.
love it... the Red Sea that wasn't red, your red hat flying all the way to Australia
ReplyDeletethanks, it's a very early memory
ReplyDeleteI sailed on the Fairsky with my family when it was a cruise ship in the early seventies
ReplyDeleteWe always called her 'the boat'. Originally a cargo ship-cum-aircraft carrier (built 1941), scrapped in Hong Kong in 1980.
DeleteWonderful!
ReplyDeletethose slices of childhood memories, so vivid at times.
ReplyDeletesource of so much writing too
Delete