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Coventry Cross Royal Naval museum Portsmouth 2007
I wonder what the blacksmith would say if he knew the journey we would take;
forged in medieval times, iron nails to skew the roof beams of Coventry Cathedral;
blown apart by German bombs in 1940 — three relics, rescued from the rubble,
fashioned into a cross, given to HMS Coventry, sunk in San Carlos water
by Argentine jets in the Falklands war. Raised from the seabed;
now displayed in a glass case, inscription on the plinth still shining —
Father forgive them…
1st January — 8th April, 1917
He tells how he urged the soldiers not to be shy about writing familiar letters home; of a waitress kissing a captain in a cafe at Nouvel Hotel; of more fine snow, like sago.
He tells of a long twilight lasting until six, of setting the men to sort the stores, overhauling guns - of rain and troops and deep, stiff mud.
He tells of lark-song and letters, gifts of sonnets and cake — and a wet lilac bush and the first time he heard a thrush sing in France.
He tells of shells holes, blood-stained water beer bottles among barbed wire, partridges twanging in the field; a gramophone playing Chopin —
and in his last letter to his small, spectacled daughter Myfanwy he tells her —
there are no peacocks or swans but lots of little children about your age, without specs living in cottages; reminds her of those Welsh lullabies he used to sing at bedtime in his final — Nos da
Thinking about the money they could save they sent children sent to a Manchester mill, George Pink aged six was sold as a cotton slave.
Alverstoke men knew just how to behave, promising paupers, orphans, a new skill. Thinking about the money they would save
two sets of clothes and two guineas they gave signing their fate at the stroke of a quill. George Pink aged six was sold as a cotton slave,
worker as a piecer. He had to be brave crawling beneath machines to mend the twill. Thinking about the money they would save
the merchants worked him to an early grave, strapped him each time he flagged, beat him when ill, George Pink aged six was sold as a cotton slave
did ten hour shifts in his dusty cave, fluff in his lungs, noisy looms never still. Thinking about the money they could save, George Pink aged six was sold as a cotton slave.
Her passport describes her as five feet three but that was fifty years ago when she was as slim as an iris with a river of red hair.
Now the stem of her spine has shrunk, she barely measures four foot ten. Slack flesh hangs from her manicured hands Her lillied feet are bunioned
and the fairytale hair clings like white wisps of sheep’s wool to her pink scalp. She is doll-like, swathed in cardigans layered in petticoats and pleated skirts
and as I lift her into the wheel chair I feel the bud of her small body closing.
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