GRANDDADDY 1953.

A BOY AND HIS GRANDDADDY IN EIRE IN 1953.

Granddaddy farted.
Excuse my bottom,
He'd say, it’s always
Speaking out of turn.

The Establishment
Does not agree with
The opinion of
The lower orders,

And he’d snigger all
The way back to his
Chair where he’d pick up
A small white bag of

Humbugs and offer
You one. Gran would have
Scolded had she been
In the room, but she

Was in the kitchen
Preparing the tea.
The air had the warm
Aroma of one

Partially dying;
The baked beans have that
Effect, he said, the
Curled arthritic hand

Offering the bag
And you taking a
Humbug, sticky, black
And white, clinging to

The paper, and placed it
In the mouth trying
Hard not to breathe. The
Trenches were like that,

Granddaddy said, and
There’d be a loud shout
Along the line, Gas!
Gas! Gas! Boys, and

He bellowed it in
To the room and Gran
Would come running, her
Eyes racing ahead

Like hounds on the hunt,
And you, young and green,
Imagining the
Hun, as Granddaddy

Called them, entering
The room with apron
And strings and teapot
With their curlers in.