Oh, What a Lovely War!

Said my prayers every night
but still war came; likewise,
ration-books, black-out blinds
and cravings for bananas...
and a dad who went away.
Mum wept buckets. Never
seen her cry before. War stunk;
of candle wax and paraffin stoves,
and those blessed sirens
when they’d say, “Quick!
“In that cellar, kids!”

I truly loathed it down there...
where all our coal was stored
My gran would sit and knit;
I was glad she did. The click-clack
of needles kind of reassuring.
“When’s Dad coming back?”
I’d whine, tugging at her pinny.
“He’ll be home...by and by...
like I told you a hundred times.
Goes in one ear – out the other!”

“But, I don’t understand, Gran.
What exactly does he do
that’s so important? Why
can’t he come home, soon?”
“A courageous man, your dad.
He flies planes. Drops bombs
on them Krauts,” she’d say,
“What’s a Kraut, and anyway,
how can he tell who’s who,
from way up there?”

We never did see him again,
and years later I got to wondering
what had gone through his mind.
Vital decisions to be made;
him and other pilots, whichever
side they were on; deciding
who lives and who dies. A bit
like god, up there in the clouds....
Too high to hear that the screams
of a father, a husband or a son,
are the same in any tongue.