Songs of Boyhood Memory
Forty Years
Forty years behind me, and
If I’m lucky, another forty more.
A child of the sixties, I spent my first ten years
Learning boyhood rules, multiplication tables,
And playground, rough and tumble codes of honour.
Everything seemed a dangerous risk, and I,
Too confused to see the shades to life,
Saw it all as good or bad.
In the eighties, I became at first a teenager and then a man
But in between, I found and lost first love.
Horizons widened, my own world narrowed,
And I looked beyond my home.
Then came the nineties, and life took off. I spent many hours in pick-up trucks, aeroplanes,
Classrooms, and sandy, street-side parties.
Those seven years in Africa taught me to
Admire every sunset as if it is the last: an
African take on seize the day.
I spent the last hours of the old millennium and the first of the new
Under grey Spanish skies. Then, and all too fast
I saw Europe, Asia, and I have watched while others sway to Caribbean beats.
And now?
And now, at forty, I can be thankful
That thirty-nine is over. This worst of years
Has battered me, challenged me, rocked me like the parent of a
Willful child. Bewildered, like a boy of eight again,
Lost in a playground fight,
I have been confounded, questioning,
Finding few answers.
And so, with life’s final horizon a step nearer, I take stock.
Life’s compass has led me north to midnight Arctic seas,
South to Good Hope’s jagged shores,
East to the parched soil of Australian bush, and
West to California’s Golden Gate freedoms.
And all points in between.
I have danced under an African moon, stood frozen, blue-lipped,
In Russia’s winter snow,
Sheltered from Asian monsoon rains, and hidden from the sun in
New World jungles.
And so, if I am lucky, as many years stretch out before me, as behind.
They can be filled with sights and sounds, friendship and love.
Whatever comes, I shall try simply to be happy, come what may.
May 2009
If I’m lucky, another forty more.
A child of the sixties, I spent my first ten years
Learning boyhood rules, multiplication tables,
And playground, rough and tumble codes of honour.
Everything seemed a dangerous risk, and I,
Too confused to see the shades to life,
Saw it all as good or bad.
In the eighties, I became at first a teenager and then a man
But in between, I found and lost first love.
Horizons widened, my own world narrowed,
And I looked beyond my home.
Then came the nineties, and life took off. I spent many hours in pick-up trucks, aeroplanes,
Classrooms, and sandy, street-side parties.
Those seven years in Africa taught me to
Admire every sunset as if it is the last: an
African take on seize the day.
I spent the last hours of the old millennium and the first of the new
Under grey Spanish skies. Then, and all too fast
I saw Europe, Asia, and I have watched while others sway to Caribbean beats.
And now?
And now, at forty, I can be thankful
That thirty-nine is over. This worst of years
Has battered me, challenged me, rocked me like the parent of a
Willful child. Bewildered, like a boy of eight again,
Lost in a playground fight,
I have been confounded, questioning,
Finding few answers.
And so, with life’s final horizon a step nearer, I take stock.
Life’s compass has led me north to midnight Arctic seas,
South to Good Hope’s jagged shores,
East to the parched soil of Australian bush, and
West to California’s Golden Gate freedoms.
And all points in between.
I have danced under an African moon, stood frozen, blue-lipped,
In Russia’s winter snow,
Sheltered from Asian monsoon rains, and hidden from the sun in
New World jungles.
And so, if I am lucky, as many years stretch out before me, as behind.
They can be filled with sights and sounds, friendship and love.
Whatever comes, I shall try simply to be happy, come what may.
May 2009