the class radio in ‘59

the class radio in ‘59

"Bobby Shaftoe’s gone to sea,

silver buckles on his knee,

he’ll come home and marry me,

bonny Bobby Shaftoe"

Sang the school radio back in ‘59;

what did it all mean? Surely

the teacher played it for a reason?

It never occurred to me 

that he was having tea.

Now doesn’t that take the biscuit?

For I thought there was a corpus of thought 

(although the word corpus was unknown to me)

that we, in our poor school were not privy to,

this world across the buckled sea,

and we were afforded this peep, once a week,

of all the worlds across the sea,

that were far from me, 

and Bobby Shaftoe would never marry 

any of the girls in my class warfare.

I knew there was the sea of course,

we heard the ships hooters come over the hill

at New Year to drown out the factory hooters.

And we knew that the river, down there, 

ran into the sea. 

(Why didn’t it walk? - but I digress - again).

My uncles went to sea and brought back

exotic gifts for me, and so, I thought

I could be Bobby Shaftoe see, I could!

I could be Bobby Shaftoe see!

And maybe, we could sing like that singer

on the radio, in the corner of the classroom,

glowing as we giggled and wriggled 

in our rows of ability. But we giggled see

because everyone wanted to be

Bobby Shaftoe see; 

and the girls all wanted to be buckled 

to his silver buckles see? 

And the braking waters of the sea

did stir something deep

that was too deep for them

this side of puberty.

(But I digress - retune the radio)

Anyway, that’s what Bobby Shaftoe

meant to me,

when the teacher had his tea,

and the singer on the radio spoke to me.

       Now they use Ritalin you see,

              to stop them fidgeting.

   And Ritalin marries Ritalin;

                      and no one ever gets 

to see the rough sea;

where Bobby Shaftoe has finally buckled

under the weight of modernity.

The schools run from the rising tides.

The tsunami ships are dropped inshore, 

and ships are high and dry on the Arral sea.

Alas, no one will come home to marry me to

the tides of history. 

For no smartphone says

the truth these days. We are racing forward

on the bow wave of breaking history;

and cold, old Bobby Shaftoe blue,

lies deep beneath the iceberg you 

know is tarrying there ahead,

to marry the end

to the beginning 

of the this sad saga sea.

And ...

Will this wobbly shaft of woe,

  Will this buckled poem 

  come home from my ‘I see’

and marry my thoughts to thee?