D’you know what, there are certain memories that a kid retains about the freedom and excitement out playing in all weathers with all your mates from Cecil Road. So, I thought I would compose a poem of those memories remembering the heady days of childhood. Just behind the houses of Cecil Road, there was a large expanse of wasteland us kids called, “The Pit”. This for me was a dreamland, a place to live out any fantasy I wished, a place to explore, breathe the fresh air, collect slow worms, and to listen to the background cacophony of constant birdsong.
I hope that you enjoy the poem.
Adventures on the wasteland
Raised on a piece of open wasteland
where brambles and broken bottles were strewn
my heart yearns for a return to that wasteland
where my young life was hewn
How often I have pondered
that happiness is rearranged
a wilderness of rugged beauty
that passing time has changed
I held on tightly riding bareback
a thousand fantasies to fill
memories that thankfully keep me young
of playing over “The Pit” at Horns Mill
Relentless, life’s clock keeps ticking on
and over my shoulder, I see what was then
I still feel that excitement that drove me
I see it time and time again
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On the theme of childhood adventures, I lived in the two cottages that if I remember rightly, were on a farm track leading to Stanstead Abbots. We were seperated from the farm at Waters place by the railway line and the river ford crossing, both a source of fun and amusement to a kid of around seven or eight years old that I would have been at that time. The railway line passed the bottom of our garden, within some 50 yards of the house so it was a major feature of living there. Every Sunday morning the rail authority would run a slow train along the lines to Stanstead Abbots to check for faults etc, and as it passed our garden the driver would halt, sound his whistle and I would jump on the footplate and ride the route to its end at the station and then be brought me home around an hour or so later. As we got to my house he would ‘accidently’ lose a large lump of coal from his load, and this would keep our fire going til the following week. These were the best of times!