Before we go much further
I think I should explain
That though we'd travelled quite a lot
Each place felt the same
Just another army camp
Another Aldershot.
Rheindahlen,
where we went to school was big as it got,
Joint Headquarters for Allied Troops.
The biggest base around.
We'd bus there from Wickrath
Almost every day
But we'd only meet one German
As we went on our way.
We'd wait till everyone
Was on the bus
Then someone would say,
'Alles Farah', we're all on
And he'd drive us away.
So we hardly saw Germans
And spoke to them even less.
There's a story about this
that grieves me still
And makes me quite cross
Of how at school
When they gave us 'choice'
They insisted I learn Latin
No German at all.
So the German I learned
Was picked up here and there
Or came out of comics
And stories of war.
So think back to our leisure
When we're playing football.
It'd just be all us English kids
No Germans at all.
YOU ARE READING
Summer of Sixty Six
PoetryThey say if you remember the sixties you were not there but if you don't remember the summer of sixty six you were not born or are not English. Summer of Sixty Six is my take on the events of that summer recounted in verse. It swings between the Eng...
