The place I lived when I was ten
I sometimes think of there, and then,
And when I'm drowsing in my chair
My dozy thoughts go back to there.
I rest nearby a fireside glare
A glass in hand and here is where
I think of things I used to do
When I was merely eight and two.
But this was when my world was new,
And in the hours before I grew,
Outside the door and down the way,
For, this is where I used to play.
When all the words I used to say
Concerned such things as came that day.
I hear the songs I used to sing
And all the joy that they would bring.
No more I live where I was king
Yet still the memories from there ring.
I've been aside so long a time
Yet still the memories from there chime.
So as I dream of days, sublime;
As recollections higher climb;
I sometimes now remember when...
And how I wish that I was ten.
-
Author:
ASJ (Pseudonym) (
Offline) - Published: January 20th, 2021 08:23
- Comment from author about the poem: A simple poem here inspired by Thomas Hood's 'I remember, I Remember', with (I think) just little of A. E. Housman's uncomplicated style also.
- Category: Reflection
- Views: 52
- User favorite of this poem: L. B. Mek.
Offline)
Comments6
A glorious set of reasons for remembering dear Alan - - I love the use of tight rhyming as it brings the scenes of back then to life.
Hello Fay. Thank you for your compliments. I tightened the rhyming scheme up a little so as not to copy T. Hood. I decided to go aa,bb, - bb,cc etc whereas Mr. Hood, all those years ago, used abcb,defe, and so on....
'I Remember, I Remember' has inspired many poems over the years, notably Phillip Larkin. It was classicmister at MPS who rekindled my memory of this so my thanks him today.
Ex animo, Alan
Was you ten, millions of years ago - or seems that long?! heehee.
Good write Alan. Yes, happy Primary School days for me then. And - all would rush to take the school bunnies/mice/hamster home for the school holidays.
One said: 'Oh I understand a child; I was one once!'
Yes Steve, millions. Well, sixty anyway ~ three score years and ten now (as Moses put it). School holidays? I got lumbered with the school horse. He ate lake a ~ well, like a horse I suppose. There were only around thirty people in my school (never mind in my class), twenty nine on a Friday if the sun was shining.
Ex animo, Alan.
Thanks giving us all an excuse to look back. Playful, sincere, and yet just the right degree of sentimentality. Love the line: No more I live where I was king.
Hi J,
I had to blow the dust off this one as it goes back a few years. Where I lived when I was ten (1961) there were 5 cottages and an inn surrounded by nine farms. It was a fair place to grow up and is still virtually untouched by the house builders' wrath. I live thirty miles away now though an equally fine place to be.
Kind regards, Alan
Your poem, plus the colouring you’ve added in your comments, paint a picture of an idyllic environment you both lived and are living in, Alan. Congratulations.
Dave
I guess that anyone's childhood is good or bad and maybe shapes their whole life Dave. I think the word that describes mine so well is 'free'. I was free to do as I liked (within reason) and did so. Most of my friends had either four hooves or four paws. I often slept with the horses in summer and the adults thought I was crazy but I knew I wasn't, they were. I wrote my poem 'There's Nothing in the Night like the sound of the Wind' in 2000 when I remembered sleeping in the barn with the wind creaking the timbers and rattling the shutters.
www.mypoeticside.com/show-poem-113894
Kind regards, Alan
Such innocent times brought back in your words Alan.
Andy
Thanks Andy, great days for me. I am fortunate in that I remember it well.
Ex animo, Alan
wonderful flow, wisely choosing to utilise rhyming's whimsical element, to help imbue youth's 'carefree' gaiety within your words of longing and remembrance,
a beautiful read from start to finish
Thank you for your compliments L.B. I appreciate you stopping by. Thanks also for your 'fave'.
Kind regards, Alan
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