Houses so close they keep their elbows in.
Tired geriatrics spec-built fot the less well-off.
The nearest phone, shops, public transport too
In Dad’s day far away on higher ground.
No piped hot water then, fridges unknown.
Each day’s necessities a trudge uphill.
At my first sight since infant days, I’m shocked.
My father and his brother spent their youth here.
In full-on-sunshine days the way Dad told.
His tantalising twenties, gone, beyond my reach.
But see this narrow, steep, horse-traffic street
Chloresterol restricted by parked cars.
And yet, pre-school, I’d in a way lived here.
Our rented house, remote from shops, bus, trains.
Wood-range hot water. Irons by Mrs Potts,
Copper, wringer, long-drop, rubbish hole for tins.
A trek to shops. We’d meet with those returning
To stop, to greet, share gossip in those phone-rare days.
And streets are really people not location.
To translate here my once near family.
People walking, shoe resoling, collar turning,
Rag-mat making, hand-me-downing, poor but nice,
Would make Dad right to think this place near-heaven.
The very brink of heaven was precisely where he lived.