(Memorial order of tin hats)
seemed so pleased at my arrival, he had some boys deliver the
biggest fridge I’d ever seen, as a favour to a ‘special’ tenant,
and in his bare room in the ground floor basement hung an
enormous photograph of his presentation to a young Queen,
in recognition of long years as a Japanese prisoner of war.
Several times he invited me to a party of old comrades
which I eagerly accepted, but he always forgot, and just
as I was about to give up hope, he turned up
at my door one evening with a smile and a set of keys,
and I drove his battered old car through unfamiliar streets
and we got lost, and arrived just in time as the old chaps
took their seats; someone fumbled with the light switch;
and in the darkness the commanding officer struck a match
and lit a candle that was melted onto an upturned tin helmet
placed on the table in front of him. And round and about me,
I felt old backs stiffen, and for a brief moment as the Transvaal
sun went down, any trace of dementia had all but disappeared.
John H Davies
24th April 2011
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