Recollections

Hong Kong harbour 1979

sitting high and mighty on my dad’s shoulder

age 5, punished shamed in the middle of the classroom

seeing my baby brother at the hospital, my father saying What big feet!

                                                            wondering if that was polite

bursting the biggest bubbles with a finger

an American accent on the black telephone then being sent upstairs

my first sight of rubber flip-flops on deck at Aden

tumbling about, feeling green, in a plane in a Taiwan sky

the humid diesel home-smell of  the harbour

the Bolton miner’s son at the university disco

my father asking: Does university teach you to be ladylike?

the brass band broadcasting our anti-Gulf War demo

my blistered feet squeezed tight into cheap boots on high moors

the rock-hard gentle brother’s voice at the door

my son taking his first steps for the childminder

my mother’s cold forehead never to be warm again

a chrysanthemum orgasm spent

Starting with a prompt of 'I remember' and a list, this is today's draft poem for my April poem a day challenge, inspired by NaPoWriMo.