As if my magic

I’m led blindfold into the Dilworth’s front room

My knees tremble, tummy turns.

I’m eight years old.

 

My knees tremble, tummy churns.

Other kids giggle.

I pick out Andrew’s.

 

He let me hold a baby chick in my palm.

Its warm heart ticking.

I’m eight years old.

 

‘Do you want to feel Nelson’s eye?’ Andrew

asks. The answer is no. I say, ‘Yes.’

I’m still here.

 

I’ve held many hearts since then, including

my own. Dipped fingers in many places

I shouldn’t.

 

My knees tremble, tummy turns.

I’m eight years old.

Still here.

I was 7 or 8 when this incident occurred in Hornsea where we lived for 3 years down Edenfield Avenue. They were significant years. I learned to ride my bike on the cinder track which was our road, I fractured my arm, I used to walk home from school along the beach. Our road was a cul-de-sac and there were other families with children, including the Greens and the Dilworths of this poem. In the Dilworth’s garden we started to dig down to Australia. The Dilworths had chickens in their garden. We’d moved from Hull, a city, where the garden was grass with a clothes’ line. Growing vegetables and having animals wasn’t something we did at that time. 

The poem is published in Reach Poetry, 277, November 2021

The photo of Hornsea groyne is by Paul Harrop/CC BY-SA 2.0 and was downloaded from Wikipedia