The Library

Half passed nine and sunny
in my dressing gown
Jack fussing for breakfast.
What's in the news today?
Will find out when I go for coffee
listen to other drinkers
regurgitating the Mail
believing every word.
I'll read my paper when they've gone
share it when I'm home
just like Dad with the Reynolds News
Chronicle and Yorkshire Post.
never had the Wizard
never saw the Beano,
read the Childrens' Newspaper
do you remember that?
The little library in the corner
school prizes some from Sunday school,
most were Mum's....
Treasure Island. Bronte,
Golden Treasury, "every thing you need to know"
a forbidden book on anthropology
hidden at the back learned a lot from that;
more and to the point from the medical book
beside the neglected Kingsley.
Then Sunday nights at half passed eight
the Sunday Play on the wireless
Lorna Doone and Fumanchu
Dickens.Moby Dick,
eating supper at the table,
never on our knees.
Nostalgia is not what it was
or so I've heard it said
but I think I've told the truth
This is what it was.