Second Wind

A Life in Places

I've lived my life in places
I've lived it here and there
You'll find me in here somewhere
Though God alone knows where.

Aldershot my birth place
For born a soldier's son
But a soldier's life's a hard one
And quickly we moved on.

Trieste would be our next stop
In nineteen fifty three
Tito threatens its border
So I'm an evacuee.

Back for a while to Yorkshire
Where my sister was born
But soon from 'God's own county'
We'd once again be torn.

Germany now beckoned
School on a Luftwaffe camp
Foreign airmen marching
Life with a foreign stamp.

Another spell in Yorkshire
Scarborough by the sea
Dad away and kids now three
Struggling in B&B.

Cyprus fresh from its troubles
A new home in the sun
The Turks had not yet invaded
The island was still one.

Larnaca, Famagusta
Now become no man's land.
Finally Dhekelia
Three years on Cyprus sand.

Back for a while to Wiltshire
Then to Berkshire fields
Enjoyed for a time our own green land
And England's rolling hills.

But packed off again to Germany
To spend another three years
Uprooted again and struggling
To hold back teenage tears.

Returning again to my birthplace
A place I'd scarcely set foot
But off yet again to college
With scarcely time to set root.

Two years at college in London
But yearning now for abroad
Next stop Kano, Nigeria
Striking a different chord.

Travelled some in West Africa
Two more years of sun
Then came home and settled down
For almost thirty years.

But you can't settle down
And stay in one place
When you don't have any roots.
The restless gene got the better of me
Been travelling again ever since.

But I travel now as a tourist
With a home I can come back to
For packing a bag
And not coming back
Is not where I want to go.