A Quiet Corner

A peaceful corner of the garden. I can imagine St Francis and Buddha would have got on well together.

My Memory of September 3rd 1939

As it is the 7oth anniversary of the start of WW2 maybe I should jot down what I can remember of that day. It seems to be something that people in my age bracket are expected to do. For a long time I wanted nothing to do with my memories of that terrible time.
I knew that the war was coming but I cannot say that I was afraid. When gas masks were handed out in 1938 I was terrified. For some reason I very frightened by the thought of gas, I cannot quite think why. I probably heard someone talking about the gas of WW1 when I was very young and it must have stayed in my mind.
I have a vivid picture of the moment when war was declared. I was playing in the garden with my little brother, John. The sun was shining brilliantly. My mother was sitting on a porch at the back of our bungalow finishing some sewing of blackout material for the windows. I think the time was 11am. I went indoors to listen to the announcement and then went back in the garden. I think Dad must have been indoors listening to the radio.
I think it was mid afternoon that our evacuee was brought to us. Her name was Joyce and she was 14 years old. I was 12, 13 in October. . My brother was 6. Joyce seemed a lot older than I was, and she did not seem shy. I don’t know how she felt inside. I went out with her sometimes while she was with us. I remember going on an outing with a group of evacuees. We were taken to Stambridge. There was a mill there and a river. I paddled and managed to cut my foot quite badly on something sharp in the mud. I remember that someone cleaned and plastered my foot.
The air raid warning went off during the first night. We all went into a passage where there were no windows. This was for fear of broken glass in the event of anything happening. Nothing did happen and we all went back to bed.
Joyce was with us for about three months I think it was. By that time my area was no longer considered safe and the evacuees were taken away.

The Innocence of Animals

In some strange way, when I looked at animals of great variety.
At different times and in different moods,
Ferocious animals and mild,
Large and small,
I was often reminded of my dear old marmalade cat.
“How is this”? I thought,
How can this be?
Where there is no resemblance
How can I be so reminded
Now and then this idle consideration occupied me
But with no serious thought
‘til one day the common factor entered my mind.
What was this resemblance but the innocence of animals,
A shared possession that looks out
From the faces of all God’s creatures
Save humankind.
WE have free will.
They have the innocence of instinct.
We have the heights and the depths,
Glory and dishonour;
THEY have innocence.