Father as a Young Man by Christine Fowler

Twenty-five a good age
young and strong.
Proud family man
providing for your 
wife so sweet,
your first-born son
and your smallest child
your daughter.
Then jobs are lost
economies crash
and Jarrow marchers
walk the long cold road
with hungry faces
and desperate hearts;
where only a cold welcome awaits.
And so no longer proud
picking sea coal
with it's spitting warmth.
A half penny here,
a penny there when sold.
A loaf of bread and margarine
now the fare that's set upon the table.
Both parents denying their empty bellies
as they push the bread towards the
children dear.
The little one, hot and limp,
they rush to the hospital
no half-crown for the GP.
The father visited 
and peeled one grape
she loved her daddy
and so, she ate.
Next day the telephone box visited,
his return ashen faced.
My little girl;
my little girl has gone.
As tears roll down the face
of that once handsome and proud,
young man.

About the Author:

Christine Fowler has always written a poem to process major events, but only began seriously writing and performing poetry in 2019. Starting in her sixties means she come to poetry with a lot of life experience, which is reflected in her poetry. She has had poems published in the Gentian Journal (Issues 6 & 7) an anthology, and has several poems accepted and in the process of publication. Her poems are illustrated on her website https://www.christinefowlerpoetry.com

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