Long time no blog, so here's a poem to be going on with

This poem is in memory of Joe Palmer, a splendid man, one time landlord of the Crown Inn Elton, where I had my wedding reception, who died holding a glass of scotch at the bar of the Flying Services Club, Peterborough, many years ago. I hasten to add that although the manner of Joe's death (which he would have said was a very good way to go) was the inspiration for the poem, Joe himself was nothing like the character in the poem. He was a character who haunted the bar of the Bull Hotel when I was a trainee manager there. Finally, the poem was born from my overhearing two ladies on the bus discussing a funeral. One said to the other "He was one of three brothers you know." "Was he really?" said the other. Such trivia are often all that is needed to inflict yet another poem on the world.


ONE OF THREE BROTHERS



One of three brothers, she said, as if
that made a difference to the fact that he was dead.
One of an ancient unity, a faded photograph, now brown
with history, the silence of a distant past.
No sound comes out of photographs.

I knew him as a hobbling gnome, his head
shook and his gnarled hands found it difficult
to hold the beer glass which was central
to his life. He used the pub that I used,
waved his stick at me, at any human being
who acknowledged him, and grinned
his toothy gratitude to all who bought him beer.

An old man waits for death with shaking hands.
He hobbles through the wilderness of age,
his close-knit childhood, like a wave of strength
has rolled him to this hoary beach alone.
He is the last sad trickle of his family stream.
He waits the next great wave to bear him home.

One of three brothers? Well I never thought
there could be duplicates of him, the evil
letcher, sizer up and down of lovely girls.
He never harmed them and they laughed at him.
Their laughter made his gnarled heart leap
and showed the gaps between his nicoteeth.
He quivered with excitement and desire.

The girls all flirted with him, listened to his tales
of life that ended when their mothers had been young.
They kissed his cheeks and held his hands.
He cursed them for tormenting him.

Then one day Henry raised his glass, about to say
“Cheers,” but died before the word came out.
The girls he had just verbally abused cried, “Oh.”
The man who bought his last pint, unconsumed,
said nothing. Henry made no sound, as he
fell backwards on the beer soaked ground,
but as he fell his hand reached out and placed his pint
upon the bar. It sat there steadily, brim full,
and no hand reached for it.

Somewhere across the Universe,
perhaps two brothers welcomed him,
and handing him a foaming pint
said “Cheers!”