X. Play, games, puzzles
HOW TO PLAY (I)
I would swing in and out the window bar to
drive the house like a tram. The clouds made it move
though it didn't. My model yacht the wind blew
to new lands on the other side of the pond.
The great steam-trains that screamed past in the groove
of Blackrod hill, weren't Hornby's or mine. So fond
of my Hornby set, I wished that the tin rails
could be real. I shot down the Dinky Toy
planes. My hand, that flew them, crashed them. The scales
didn't matter, for I could safely decoy
all my Luftwaffe pilots into the flak
over Manchester, in flames from my attack.
HOW TO PLAY (II)
Going 'Click-click!' with your tongue, you got
hold of the rein made of nothing with one hand;
with the other you slapped your behind 'cause what
you were pretending to be was a cowboy
and his horse, but which part of you was horse and
which was the cowboy you didn't mind. Your toy
gun was left back at home so in the school yard
holding a gun was done without holding it
'cause your two fingers shot, and the trigger-guard.
barrel and handle were hand. Then you could fit
both your legs to a gallop. Shot in the head
you fell off. You were living when you were dead.
HOW TO DIE
You'd hear tongues shooting — 'Dah! Dah!', and with an 'Airrh!'
and one hand clasped to chest, the other open,
arm outstretched, to the life you'd act death's despair
as you crumpled and choked, keeping fingers out
of the way of the running feet. You knew, when
it was your turn, you'd see falling to your shout
as a gun all those puppet bodies. You had to
give up power now; otherwise, they wouldn't
recognize yours. How good it was, though, to do
it so bravely. When he said, 'I got you, didn' I!'
you could think it was you that got you to die.
TEAM GAMES IN THE PLAYGROUND
What was nice about Trust Weight and the other team
games was the people in your troop. Like Tommy,
who could leap over three. Ted was a dream
buffer — could hold your head like a vice. Kevin,
he was thin and so two could sit easily
with him on one back. When was our turn to be in,
Sammy's tall legs made leap-frogging over him
hard, and then Albert's back, so firm, it was best
in the middle. You might, they said, break a limb.
Nobody did. Each team would play as a test.
Your troop cheered you so loud, and you cheered the troop.
We'd go back into school feeling cockahoop.
FORT-DA!
Babies liked Peek-a-Boo. You got down behind
something. They didn't like not knowing where you
had gone. Right away they would try to find
where you had hidden yourself. You'd make some sort
of a noise, not a word, just a sort of clue —
breathing or sighing — didn't want to get caught
at the start — and they'd know that that solid screen
(armchair or curtain) wasn't really alive,
had a person inside who couldn't be seen.
While they, afraid, crept round it, you had to dive
out of sight. But, at last, you cried "Peek-a-Boo!"
and popped up. They are happy to find it's you.
FLICKING A ROPE
As a child, did you flick a long rope to make
ripples go snaking along right to the end of it?
Something sneaky about them, wobbling their fake
selves through a rope that wasn't them. Did you see
as they dwindled away, the last bend of it
twitch as they slipped into nowhere? Could they be
going on like a Loch Ness Monster somewhere
under the ground, just because I moved my hand
up and down not a minute ago? Unfair
one little movement of mine would go on and
on and not stop. Wherever were they fleeing?
It was me, though, that flicked them into being.
ROLLING A HOOP
All the fun of a hoop was it ran with your
push. It was you gave it life. It went searching
ahead, rolling and bouncing, always so sure
where it was going, even sideways into
a brick wall, but your tap brought it back. Lurching
over the cobbles, grittily leaping through
crofts, flying off edges of pavements so
springily like the fat man in the Skegness
poster. You, only you, were to make it go,
tame like a horse with a bridle. Were careless
once: it went down Bob's Brew as fast as a ball;
out of reach of your tap, ran into a wall.
HIDE AND SEEK
'Hide and Seek' was a good game, especially
up in the gorse near the Cottage. Were two parts
you could play. You could hide from discovery
quiet underneath some bracken, all alone
with the sound of the wind, Some ladybird starts
climbing a grass and you watch it till it's flown
away, covers wide open like knights' helmets.
There you feel cosy and lost at the same time,
and you hear them go by and don't mind. Minutes
later, you're 'seeking' instead. You turn and climb
and go down on a hill you don't understand.
You've to find what is lost in a cheating land.
HIDE-AND-SEEK IN THE GORSE
It was good playing hide-and-seek in the gorse.
Made such a maze, and you couldn't see through it.
Had to keep to the spaces: you couldn't force
through without scratches, but you didn't much mind
all the prickles especially when you could fit
into a cave of brown crystals. Couldn't find
you for hours. You'd see bees cleverly miss
thorns to go poking the flowers, which were like
Spanish helmets or bishops' mitres, notice,
down there inside, how the sun turned each spike
into black making spikes of itself. Alone,
you were hidden away so quiet and unknown.
TIG
When you're touched, you are 'It'. What was being 'It'?
Everyone fled you. You were a kind of bee
that could sting and they hated you, or a nit
nasty and smelly that nobody wanted.
There were some kids would cry if you all stayed free.
Best was to think you're a devil, a wicked
demon chasing them all with a terrible
evil hand, ready to cast them all to hell.
You could roar, show your teeth — they'd be touchable
then, as all scared, some bumped and some tripped and fell
and were victims for you, and you'd won the day.
But the magic was gone. Now you were the prey.
THE FUN IN CRICKET
You could see what was fun when you played cricket.
Balls from the bowlers, they had to attack him,
be a danger, a threat, snap at his wicket,
fumble a bail, make him offer an easy
catch, a straight LBW, give him slim
chances of runs. But was a sort of teasy
situation, because your very attack
flying along, he could see as a weakness
if he knew how to treat it. Could flip it back
if it flew up for a catch; that dangerous
spinner swerved at the wicket could be turned more
and fly off for a six and prop up the score.
CROQUET
I like croquet. And Daddy had bought a set.
Specially liked that the mallets and balls matched:
they had red rings and blue rings — you wouldn't get
mixed up when playing 'cause where your ball was made
all the difference. A teasing game, where you snatched
victory away from your rival, could put paid
to his chances although you were behind by
several hoops. At the ends were smart posts in
red and green you'd to hit and get back to. Why
did all of us find it such fun to ruin
someone else's good play? Made it a stranger
game than others, to play dog-in-the-manger.
THE COLOUR ON THE CROQUET BALLS
On the balls of the croquet set were red,
blue, green and yellow lines like equators grooved
round the middle. They matched the rings on the head
part of the mallets — you knew which one to play
with. Was yours and you'd feel that the colour proved
yours was the best, whichever you had that day,
seeing red like a soldier's, who was bound to
win; and the blue was a bobby's, in charge; green
was for spring and the grass and the leaves. Right though
all of the hoops went the yellow and clean
knocked the others for six — gold for the sun.
So whichever the colour, it made it fun.
THE RULE ABOUT STRAW CADIES
They said, 'Nip! A straw cadie, and no nips back!'
Nips hurt, for 'nip' meant the same as 'pinch'.
Wasn't fair they could come along and attack
you in that way. Was declaring a new rule
you'd had nothing to do with. You'd not an inch
letting you out of it. You felt such a fool
with the nip hurting still. Only chance was to
watch for a straw cadie yourself, but the first
time, they made out they really thought you knew
what a straw cadie was, and that was the worst —
Was a law and it caught you. Was no use.
Police took 'I don't know it' as no excuse.
BURNING HOLES WITH THE SUN THROUGH A LENS
I liked lenses for burning holes in paper.
Putting a miniature sun just in one place
turned it brown; then the smoke, like from a crater,
zigzagged, a snake, in the wind; then the red star
and the flame, and it left on your eyes a trace
green if you closed them, or, open, a pink scar
all in wriggles that followed wherever you
looked. You could try it on you skin — you could see
just how long you could stand it. There were a few
boys who would boast, seemed to find a sort of glee
in their betting who longest. Worse that the cane.
Couldn't see what the point was in bearing pain.
MAGNETS
I liked playing with magnets. All the pins would
dangle, a zigzag necklace — there'd be a last
one that wouldn't join on. Round ones you could
stick round the grate or under the mantelpiece —
had to keep them away from watches. Stuck fast
one way to each other — best way to release
them was sliding them off. But the other way
there were invisible springs — sort of bouncing
with the air or with nothing, and you could play
pushing them round a plate or set them flouncing
anywhere that you wanted and they wouldn't
know what did it. A penny, though, just couldn't.
PLAYING WITH THE PIANO
If you opened the top of the piano,
put your foot on the loud pedal and shouted,
all the strings shook together, made an echo.
It was your own voice but metal, went on humming
for a long time, so long, so faint you doubted
you could hear it — perhaps you were pretending.
Funny, metal could speak — just some tightened strings
and a few nuts and bolts and you'd think a ghost
was inside, as if you had turned into things
and you'd never come back. Why, you could almost
feel you'd vanished away, your soul becoming
like the end of a tune, just nothing, humming.
SKIPPING STONES ON THE WATER
Skipping stones on the water. How many could you
get was the challenge — skippings before drownings,
that is. Seven was the average, though a few
managed a ten. You had to have a good stone
for a start: with a bad one, skilful flickings,
giving that special spin, were no use — you'd thrown
it straight in. Then a wave could always appear
when it was not wanted, and that wonder-spun
flat one, zippiest beauty, lost its career
out to the dazzle. Still the finest of fun
was to see those rings widen behind, linking
all their loops, and forget about sinking.
BLOWING BUBBLES THROUGH A RING
When you blew through the ring and made bubbles, they
hung in the air like glassy apples on trees
that were moving, the bigger drifting away
turning to smaller, no bigger than the small
that were near. You could see dizzy vortices
squirming their lacquer graphics over the ball
of the delicate water, on those nearby;
turning to sparkles far away, and I found,
as the light breeze went shifting them off, my eye
saw them en bloc, a Solar System, the ground
become cloud that was passing away. And then,
as they popped, all the ground became still again.
RUNNING ALONG RAILINGS WITH A STICK, ETC.
You could run along railings with a stick — they'd
clatter like ratchets: out of stillness came sound.
On your bike you could let off a fusillade
just with a folded packet jammed in your brake.
What a tattoo from walls! — You heard it resound,
hammer itself back from the tram -—lamps would make
sudden thumps, wooden fences roar, hedges hiss,
open streets gasp at your passing; and the pole
took a hump right along the wire with a kiss
sparking like fireworks, but the wire didn't bowl
along too. At the end, the hump disappears.
does a body go rapping like this through years?
FINGER-MAN
When you walked with your fingers, a man walked. Though
he had no body like yours, he did have one
all the same, and was you with finger and toe,
head, face, and everything else. When he went walking
straight up table- or chair-legs after some fun,
he was still on a flat road. Heard him talking
with no mouth and no breath about exciting
things he was doing. When he jumped, he went over
a huge chasm six inches deep, and fighting
(he did a lot) was always a pushover
against left-handed men. And he never feared
anybody even though he just disappeared.
THE FINGER MAN
When you walked with your fingers, he limped. He could
lean to one side, then he wouldn't. Wherever
he went walking around or whether he stood
looking about him, he was humped up like those
crippled people with one big boot. Was clever,
though, for he'd climb up anywhere that he chose
and would only fall down if he wanted to.
Should he decide to, he would never be hurt.
Being crippled was nothing to him. He knew
just how to jump the Knees Ravine, put a spurt
on to win in a race, walk straight up a wall.
Being lame wasn't any bother at all.
FINGER-TRICK
Daddy bent his thumb over on his right hand.
Then on his left hand he bent his forefinger.
Then they were fitted together. As a band
over the join, his left forefinger. And next
came the fright: we who watched had no idea
what had gone on. After, even when he flexed
the left finger to show us it was all there,
letting us all feel it to make sure, the shock
wouldn't go. And you wondered how could he dare
fool us like that with a fat thumb like a block
right on top of a thin finger. Couldn't scoff,
'cause it stuck in your mind, that top coming off.
FINGER CHURCH
'There's the church,' he would say, 'and there's the steeple.'
(Fingers made arches and roof; two more pointed.
And then next:) 'Look inside and see the people.'
(Turning over:) 'There's the parson walking upstairs.'
(All the fingers were steps, and the thumbs jointed
stubby legs.) 'There he is, saying his prayers.'
Was a kind of odd story. Fingers weren't really
part of a church or a steeple. They couldn't
become steps on a pulpit. Thumbs were merely
thumbs and not legs, and, after all, legs wouldn't
walk when no body told them. But it made you search
in the hands, did the story. You saw a church.
UNCLE CHARLIE'S TRICKS WITH STRING
Uncle Charlie would take a loop of string, weave
it with the fingers of both hands in a kind
of slow knitting of knots, and soon he would leave
it like a gift between his hands, the 'Armchair',
or the 'Crown', or the 'Window'. In space you'd find
he had constructed a sculpture out of air
and taut string. Found them fascinating when
you looked very close. All his movements had combined
like some music and made links and loops that drew
parts both towards and away, and made them wind
into harmony, all pulling different ways.
Didn't want him to let them loose from my gaze.
WATERWORKS
There the puddle was full and still, a sun-charged
fullness. Settled the delicate mud, fibrous,
every speck microscopically enlarged,
a fine bloom in the hollows, brilliantly
distinct. Here down the slope, ruts were waterless;
cracks were gaping with thirst. So urgently
I'd begin with a stick making a channel,
working up to the water. If time was short,
I would kick with my heel: if long, a careful
engineering with sharp stones, giving much thought
to the cutting of roots. Then the dam burst,
and the puddle in turn was left to its thirst.
WORLD-LINES
After reading the relativity books
(Gamow et al.), I would draw these wriggling lines
down the page. Some were waves; some jerked in crooks
regular, irregular; some curved; some straight;
some diagonal. For what, these strange designs?
Took a sheet of paper. Playing at fate.
Cut a slit of a millimetre across.
Placed then the slit at the top of my picture,
and then moved it down. I saw the movement toss
people through time, this way, that, under stricture
of the rate that I'd fixed. All had to leap to
my command in world lines they had to keep to.
PAPER-FOLDING
There were books in the local library on
paper folding. You took a blank square and scored
geometric shapes, hexagon, octagon,
with a steel rule, a sharp edge. Then you began
to fold. Creases would set corners in accord
with each other with hidden ease. Firmer than
glue could make them, the matched under-doublings clung
like a puzzle. That odd interfold would be
wings or sail later on, vanishing among
all that flat and tight walleting to be free
when you got to the end. Some folds wouldn't fit:
you perhaps couldn't do the difficult bit.
FOLDING PAPER
Folding paper was fun. A little tight wad,
edges pressed down with a knife-handle neatly,
and you snipped with your scissors. It was odd
seeing the chain of the people all holding
hands when all of it opened out completely.
Then you could make clever things just by folding:
little boxes, a hat, a ship that would float,
aeroplanes, vases and flowers. But the one
that for Walter and me really had out vote
then was the water bomb — a big cube, right on
top, a hole. And you filled it up for the smash.
Had to use some new paper after the splash.
SAILING PAPER BOATS
Once we took paper boats that we'd made over
into the Green Grounds, where the River Douglas
was, to race them, because you were the owner,
so it was tested against your cousin's boat,
sailing down with the current. Made you anxious
watching them spin on an eddy. They could float
behind rushes, go backward and forwards. You
could with a stick nudge yours out, but not touch it
when it went again properly. Somehow knew,
running along, it became you, a puppet
to the current, and going you didn't know
where, or whether you'd sink and end up below.
THE O'HANLANS
Pretty Mrs. O'Hanlan's eyes straightaway
turned to you as you came in. She'd ask rightaway what
you were doing. If paper-folding, she'd play
too, and she'd listen just how to make a plane,
and her husband would smile too, and she soon got
him making one. If it was cricket, again
she was first to try bowling, although under-
arm, and he would join in, showing her what
a real overarm was. She seemed to wonder
really at all we were doing then and not
notice grown-ups. But if you met him in town,
he would hardly take notice of you, or frown.
THE KELLOGG VILLAGE
One time Kellogg's had cut-outs. You could make a
village. You sent for the plan with the spaces
by the roads. There were shops — butcher and baker,
greengrocer, ironmonger, and a public hall,
and the church, and a tavern, all the places
you could imagine there. Each one had its wall
or its garden or yard. It was fun cutting
out and then sticking together. Were all bright
and colourful. Thatched roofs made with jutting-
out eaves. And, too, the Tudory black-and-white
of nice cosy homes. When you'd finished it, though,
was a bore there was nowhere for it to go.
SPILLIKINS
We played 'Spillikins'. You had to pile the sticks
up on a cup or a glass. Each took a turn.
It is easy at first: there's no need to fix
one on the next — they needn't even touch each
other. Later, though, you both had to learn,
taking some time, how to add the next, to reach
across, balancing, hooking, interlocking,
making quite sure it was safe, without knocking
the pile down — then you lost, and all the counting
scored for the other side. All the pile mounting
up was like a strange head in terrible state,
but the game was you couldn't co-operate.
THE PLAYGROUND
A low roundabout turning the whole playground
so the pal that you left would soon come round again,
standing still. A long horse which used to rebound
from the urging to gallop and hurl you back,
and then forward. A high golden slide, that, when
you let go, shot you down fast to the tarmac
where you started. A sand-pit where you could draw
what you wanted. Some stood upright on the swings
to go higher, face downward. On the see-saw
you could not fly together. Public playthings
had a snag though. Believing that play profanes
Sunday, they came and fastened them down with chains.
PLAYGROUND
There were seesaws. Did she bring you down when she
kicked with her legs, or was it you that brought you
back down? On a swing I could never see
quite how you managed to get up higher when
there was no one who pushed you. And if you thought
putting your foot down and thrusting yet again
at the snowflake-shaped roundabout to go fast
just for the thrill was the best, you remembered
that once Sammy had fractured his skull. You passed
whizzing all down through the slide, you surrendered
to the fun, could do nothing as on you sped,
till you found yourself quite still, like someone dead.
ON A SWING
On a swing try pretending that you are still:
What's the result? It's the world that tips backwards
out of sight, or the whole sky that flies uphill.
People prefer to walk up a wall rather
than disturb your ideal composure; orchards
grow at the horizontal, then switch over
till they point in the other direction,
losing not one apple just so that you are
left in absolute calm. Even the bright sun
rises and sets at your will. Nothing can mar,
nothing equal your perfect tranquillity.
Leave the others to struggle with gravity.
SWINGING ON A ROPE
Daddy hung a long rope from a tree near the
Cottage. Was for you to swing on. As Tarzan
you went out and then in. You didn't fear the
reach of its swing because you went so slowly,
and the world it went tilting away, garden,
avenue, fence — you were taking off, only
for the planets, with Earth's up-and-down all lost,
dipping away from you like the side of a
dam. You'd be off into space on your own, tossed
weightless and free. Over Horwich you'd hover
saying farewell to all, to your life as you
knew it. Hours passed, then as slowly back you flew.
STUCK IN A GROOVE
When the record was stuck in the groove it got
boring. That tale about the captain who said
to him, 'Tell us a tale' — you found that the plot
was of someone, a captain, who asked someone
for a tale (about captains). The girl on the bread
packet held in her hand a bread packet on
which a girl held a bread packet. However
hard you looked, you weren't able to see the last —
Was it girl? Was it bread? You could try whether
with two mirrors put face to face you could see past
yourself down the long corridor. When you move
needles on they play tunes, still stuck in a groove.
THE TRACKS OF MY BICYCLE
Took my cycle through puddles on drying days,
leaving trails that would last for a while, often
fading out after me as fast in the blaze
of the sun as I blazed them. The back wheel's track
was quite straight, but the front wheel's one was woven
in and out. It was free to go on one tack,
then another, but, however far you took it
over this side, you had to come back nearly
as far that. You would think the front had to fit
with the back, that the wavering was clearly
the mistake, that the wobbles were confusing
to the straight, but the front wheel did the choosing.
MY FIRST PROPER RIDE ON A BIKE
I'd forgotten the nasty fall when I had
run at the roller, so Daddy took me out,
stood the bike at the kerb. I was somehow glad
taking the chance again, so many other
boys could ride after all; they did it without
thinking, so why shouldn't I? And Tom was younger
than me. So right away I pushed from the kerb,
like from a wharf. I was sailing down the vale
as the pilot in charge. Nothing could disturb
this so marvellous voyage. Onward I'd sail
on the roads now forever in full control.
I'd be bound now to reach my tremendous goal.
CYCLING WITH NO HANDS
You could cycle with no hands. Mr. Black
said it was 'gyroscopic', for the wheels whirled
round so fast that they couldn't alter their stiff
strength that guided you on, as if you were hurled
on into space by what you'd done before. If
you tried swaying some other way, they wouldn't
let you, might give you a fright, a sort of quick
warning not to disturb them from their present
chosen direction you'd chosen, and they'd kick
you, reminding you, we'll crash it, burst a tyre,
throw you off, if you don't give us your desire.
THE AIR
When you went on your bike in the wind, you felt
brushings, soft pummellings all over. Though you
couldn't see what was doing it, it would pelt
you with a kind of tough feathers. Just
as a blind man must feel, you by yourself blew
nothing to something. A continuous gust
wriggled hair, fluttered shirt, clasped you everywhere
pushing as you pushed, buzzing, tickling, cooling
all the sweat round your forehead, as if the air
said, 'I am here all the time. You're just fooling
yourself thinking I'm not. Don't trust your seeing.
Though invisible, I have my being.'
PROPER WEAPONS
Used to wish in our fights that we had a gun
that would knock them right over, make them collapse
like a dead man without hurting them. Such fun
it would be making war. Then, even better,
we could have a machine-gun, but not with caps —
it would shoot jelly-bullets, or we'd get a
kind of cannon with smoke and shrapnel that screamed
although people would not. Or a flame-thrower
that just sent you to sleep. So easy it seemed,
so much better than wasting effort over
real guns. The conclusion was easy to draw:
why couldn't they use them in a real war?
PLAYING SHOPS ON YOUR OWN
You would hear me begin to haggle with me.
'Oh no, threepence is too much!' Red tiddlywinks
stood for threepenny bits. 'But you do agree
that this cake's of the best!' A tobacco-tin
was a cake (it was round — enough if one thinks
it's a cake). I would scratch his head as if in
doubt about it. His tongue began to argue
my conviction that twopence might make him drop
by a halfpenny, but I knew that I knew
that a cake that was so round sold in a shop
for much more than a tiddlywink. The beaten
one and winner bought what couldn't be eaten.
TALKING TO YOURSELF
It was funny to talk to yourself. 'My friend,'
that's how you call yourself, because of course you'd
be a friend who would give you anything, lend
anything, keep all your secrets, give you advice.
And you'd answer back straight, whatever your mood,
pleased to listen, say nothing except what you
wanted to hear. But Father Moylan always
used to say that your conscience would keep the true
word of the Lord in your heart. It would amaze
me, though, hearing me speak to me right out loud.
Just imagine you're standing inside a crowd.
SAILING ON THE LAWN
Made a boat on the lawn. Used the card-table
put on its side for the stern (you could stand there,
watch our wake growing smaller), for our cable
clothes-line (for mooring in the harbour, the bay
in the island of treasure), and set a chair
up for the bridge, the maiden for bow (the spray
splashing up from the rushing grass), and a sheet
tied up for sails, with a broom as the bowsprit.
Was exciting to sail to the island, beat
off all the storms. The tale, if it didn't fit,
could be altered, no trouble. We were afloat.
We preferred that ship to a proper old boat.
WALKING ON STILTS
Up on stilts you're as big as a grown-up is.
Hand must move with the foot or you might collapse.
It's a swaying and jolting game: it dizzies
you at first and you have to be ready to
let them go on their own. Once you're up perhaps
you can stay there, although, if you only knew
how to go forward, it would help. Your balance
fails, and backward steps force themselves where you don't
want to go, but you do. To gain confidence
you stride out, but that leaves you just where you won't
be allowed to escape: helpless, you are bound
to be doing the splits sidelong to the ground.
'SHOUT ROUND ME, LET ME HEAR THY SHOUTS...'
I knew Bolton had swimming-baths. We'd never
been, but there came one day Daddy took us there.
Such a noise! All the voices all went louder
so they could hear when they couldn't, and echoed
from the tiles and the concrete as if the air
shook full of springs. But the cool sunlight, it showed
just as much from below as above, jolly
flashes of ovally windows on water
that was like a giant jewel of higgledy-
piggledy lime juice. Was a special sport, a
being dandled about and a splashing through
what was pushing you, shouting as loudly too.
THE ARROWS
On the pavement I read in chalk: 'Follow this
line.' An arrow was pointing off up the road,
and another a little way on. To miss
what it promised was silly. Each arrow-head
like the crotch of a girl. Searching I followed,
finding more farther up, a comforting thread
of them. After a while they became fewer,
and their shape just a sketch, but wherever they
led, I faithfully turned; however obscure
was the mark, it was bringing me on my way
to the top. There I found what I cannot forget.
'Fuck you' was the message. What sort of a threat?
THE BEDCLOTHES MOUNTAINS
Saw the bedclothes as hills and mountains. I'd be
striving to get to the top, over the pass,
to the plateau, the scarp, the ridge. I would see
there an invisible me, miniature me,
always climbing alone — the handholds are sparse,
ledges are thin, gullies are narrow, the scree
steep and slippery, gorges precipitous,
overhangs menacing, but somehow I get
to the crest, to the peak, feeling glorious
viewing the white snows, the braided parapet
of pink rock, and the woolly forests. My deeds,
they are me! The adventure always succeeds.
THE STAIRS MOUNTAINS
Found the stairs was a lovely place for playing.
Soldiers would be the explorers. They arrived
in their cars at the base and made camp. Laying
plans to the top, they divided in two so
there could be a good race. Pity that one dived
over the cliff while they were still low
down the mountain. Was just the lieutenant, though
he was a good friend of the brave captain who's
very sorry to lose him, but when you go
off into dangerous places, you can't choose
what the risk's going to be. The others led most
of the way, but we beat them and could boast.
THE PILLARS
Mammy helped us to play sometimes. A special
game was the house in the sitting-room. A chair
on its side and the table-leafs up. Spiral
legs on the table were pillars. A blanket
made the walls. That we saw her we didn't care.
All of the house was our play-room. A titbit
or two turned into meals. Sarah was mother.
I was the father bringing the wages in.
Liked the twist of the pillars we had. Other
pillars would have seemed a pretence. Couldn't begin
to imagine a special house that didn't
have such spiralling pillars, cool and pleasant.
DRESSING UP
A conductor's hat, ticket-machine, clipper
(it removed all the pennies less than the fare)
made me master of journeys. Slate, chalk, slipper,
mortar-board, could make parents pupils. Better
still, a badge and a truncheon, and I could dare
(in a helmet) batter heads, or click a fetter
on hands. Best to wear stetsons or peaked caps
for with badges much bigger, the camouflage
more complete, and the legs protected by chaps,
holding guns was the safer. However large
was your enemy, blood was the same bright-red.
Unless you're not playing, you won't be dead.
WEARING GROWN-UPS' CLOTHES
When I put on their hats, they came down over
my eyes. Getting my arms in Daddy's coat meant
that my hands couldn't feel. The real owner
of those shoes wouldn't have to bunch up his toes
to hold on, wouldn't flop or trip as he went.
When you'd buttoned the jacket, learned how it goes
(to avoid pulling armpits, scratching your chin),
still the right way was loose — you could look inside,
see yourself to the floor. All the grown-ups laughed
till they shook, but their coat still flopped like a hide,
always slipped. So I put up with being half
their size, thought it was fine to make them all laugh.
GALENA-CRYSTAL-SET
Found galena in Anglezarke streams. Like gold
hid in the crannies, and we were prospectors.
having read ourselves into it as Ransome told
us in his Pigeon Post. Then, cleverer still,
(Arthur Mee's were the books), with these as detectors,
we could construct us a crystal-set. With will
(all our own) we went into the task. Circuit
(white upon blue) and instructions from Wireless
World, and parts out of Daddy's drawer. Then fit
all of them just as it said! We were tireless
at the work. To be wirer, welder, miner!
What a pity the real set sounded finer.
COMMUNICATION
You took two tins and drove a hole with a nail
right in the middle of the bottom. I liked
doing that, to pop jampot tops, to impale
drums of taut paper, ease balloons of tightness
with pins. You put string through the holes you'd spiked.
Waxed string, all stiffened, was the best for the purpose.
Then you knotted it hard at both ends. Two of you
walked to a distance till the string became tight
like a musical instrument. The wind blew
whinings along it, blurring words, but, in spite
of that, talk could go on. You kept connection
pulling hard in the opposite direction.
OUR ROCKET DESIGNS
We wrote books about rockets (before V2's).
We would land by canals on the planet Mars
to find civilizations established whose
scientific advance would make us heroes
back on Earth. In design they were like cigars.
Living quarters had airlocks which would enclose
you in comfort from empty space. They were set
in the nose which was pointing up to heaven.
At the tail a Mark I controllable jet,
where the fire came from tubes bringing oxygen
to the hydrogen (that made water), the whole
under perfect electrical human control.
THINGS TO DO WHEN YOU'RE BORED
You could flatten the silver paper with your
fingers until you could almost see your face
in it, but there were still wrinkles, or it tore
'cause you had pressed too hard. The chocolate
was gone. Records took different times. The space
next to the label was to keep separate
all the singing and the writing. When I'd played it
so many times I was bored, then I would try
to see if I could read what turned on a spit,
catching the words of the title as if I
didn't know what it was, I'd go on catching
then till Mammy cried, 'Stop that nasty scratching!'
INDOOR FIREWORKS
For November the 5th you could buy indoor
fireworks, like Bengal Lights that were magic matches
that burned brilliant pink and green. There were more —
specially one that would curl like a black snake.
With a crackle just like matchbox-scratches,
up would go wobbling, made of cindery cake,
with a smell of its own, out of spitting
fire, a long charcoal serpent, wriggling about
as if looking for you. It came from nothing,
bursting to life, a black and blind waterspout.
fascination and fear, temptation, disgust.
At the end it would break at a touch to dust.
BENGAL LIGHTS
Saw the green of the Bengal lights as hidden
somewhere and now poured out, all bright and intense,
like a liquid distilled from a forbidden
spring, that showed dimly in grass and leaves; a trail
of a livid red-purple burnt to a dense
scar on one's sight, that would gradually pale,
a fixed record of how your eyes had shifted.
Everyone's face glimmered with green as if we
became fairies or goblins, or we'd drifted
under the water of an emerald sea..
It was magic from fire. These dull fat matches
sprung a wonder from vision's coloured patches.
WHIRLING A SPARKLER
Found that whirling a sparkler round you could draw
circles and spirals on the dark; fast enough,
and you saw just one still circle. What you saw
wasn't part of the world. Mr. Black said
all the world and the sky are just one big bluff,
all of it atoms, and, though you see instead
all the tables and chairs, all the grass and the trees,
horses and cows, and all the men and women
and the children, he said they are 'vortices' —
whizzing around for ever. But if the spin
stops, like when you put down your sparkler, you fear
they would all, like that circle, just disappear.
AFTER FIREWORKS DAY
The next morning you'd take the old rocket stick,
throw it and make the swishing noise. You could hold
with its point to the dazzling sun the relic,
damp and all bendy, of a Roman candle.
If you scraped out the inside part of an old
Golden Volcano or Diamond Spangle
that still had a bit in it, and dried it in
sunlight and put it on paper, you would see
tiny sparkles and red-hot beads that would spin
spitting around as the flame spread suddenly
through the fading print. You could wish it was real
as you spun the hub of the catherine-wheel.
SNOWMAN
Made a ball first, an Earth of snow. It would pick
up itself as you rolled it, leaving a trail
made of nothing, a wad of carpet so thick
you' forget it was water. When it was so
big you couldn't up-end it, like a big bale
of some fluffy material, from the snow
you made man. Of the Earth you made his body,
mortared solid to ground. And another ball
you could pat with your hands into a knobby
head with poky nose, hollows you would install
with blind coal eyes that saw. Stand back to admire
what you've made. Imagine his pipe had got fire.
SNOW FOR CHILDREN
I liked snow, but grown-ups didn't. It hid
all the roads. Up Rivington you could leave footprints
that went zig-zag, and nobody would forbid
you, crossing paths and roads and fields with a new
way, your own. In the smooth drifts you could leave dints,
kicking like mad — there was no one to stop you.
You could throw it about: hitting a snowman
only would make him bigger. If you rolled it,
it would pick itself up to help you. You ran
any old where, not caring: you could still fit
your own feet in the marks. Grown-ups put a halt
to all that: they sent men with shovels and salt.
THE SLED
Daddy made a toboggan, really a sled,
stout planks across, two down each side with steel tape
on the edges to smooth the way as it sped
down through the snow. Trouble was, it was heavy,
'cause you saw that the ones with a different shape,
they were all slats. Had to buy them. Were very
dear. You couldn't complain. All the sides were all
springy like pony traps, so you went faster;
when you pulled up the hill, it wasn't a haul.
Yours would get stuck. Everything was much harder,
even pulling there to Bob's Brew. But then,
couldn't ask him to make another again.
MR. CARR'S AQUARIUM
When I saw Mr. Carr's aquarium, I
envied him it at first, but I thought I would
get bored after a while watching the half-shy
goldfish, criss-crossing all the time. I wondered
why, then, going to Blackpool, I thought it good
bringing back live cockles, for, though I treasured
them, they always would die, and tadpoles turned grey,
floating up dead, and the sticklebacks too. There
was no way you could feed them. Wrong sort of play,
really, and yet I didn't want to compare
my old jars with Mr. Carr's. Funny result.
Was there any real point in being adult?
MAKING DO
With the table and the blankets we built houses
in the house. I laid roads along the armchair
that was Daddy's at tea-time — my cars would whiz
horizontally perpendicularly.
All my tanks advanced slowly from stair to stair
to the top. Weather was particularly
bad for planes in the living-room — they crashed
on the cushions. And then, you wanted a long
track, and ends wouldn't meet for you, so you dashed
off to catch it before the engine went wrong —
Wasn't really heading right off the line.
Was as good as if Alec's rails were all mine.
'THE FLAGS OF ALL NATIONS'
You found people collected, so so did you,
tab-cards of footballers or airplanes or cars,
the best motorbikes. Some had the books to
put them in, all scrolled round with some snaky twirls.
So the cigarettes sold because of the film-stars,
comics and crooners, even just pretty girls.
Daddy's Kensitas had posh silk flags of all
nations, but no one else collected them, so
couldn't swop for the ones I'd missed, and football
ones weren't the ones I wanted. Made a fine show
all my flags, very glossy, but, because they
weren't on cards, there was no one wanted to play.
STAMP-COLLECTING
Though you'd got a complete set, was nice to swop
so the twopenny blue could be brighter blue.
Was the same but a new one. But if the shop
hadn't got any more, and you were still short,
you'd be glad of a dull one — you'd make it do.
So you can always tell pals you know you ought
to replace that one day: it wouldn't matter
even if it was torn — it looked like you'd got
the entire set. Your album's getting fatter
all the time. You can open that page or not —
it depends on who's interested. Wouldn't boast,
but in stamp-collecting, it's who's got the most.
'ON APPROVAL'
Could get stamps 'on approval' by post. Mammy
didn't approve. Said you'd no idea how good
they would be. But the Queen Astrids I was happy
with — lovely dark colours, black edges, unused,
and her beautiful face. But of course you could
get something cheap. If you knew, then you refused
them and sent them back quickly, but what if you
didn't? Those Tannu Tuvas had nice pictures,
were triangular, big, and looked very new —
Could they be real, though? Weren't there sort of forgers
printing these for a country, specially made
so that country could sell them, its only trade?
DRAWING PICTURES IN THE GREASE
In the grease on the baking-tin you could draw
shining pictures. A glossy serpent could swim
in a mercury whirlpool till what you saw
could be either the coils or the whirls. A tunnel
could be run back till far in the dim
spiral hidden things glistened. Or a puzzle
made of bars over bars, making a prison
in a prison so that, if you turned the tin
under light, glowing fetters slipped in silken
rings across all your finger-marks. You could spin
anything in that greasy freedom. It vexed
me to find each one covered over the next.
STENCILS
I liked stencils. You painted through holes and made
pictures — the daisy, the cat, the cock and hen,
and a tree, a house. Once it had been laid
flat on the paper and held still, you'd only
to go dabbing around and all your paint then
went in the right places. There was your pony,
or your lion without having to fiddle
round with a paintbrush. But sometimes the paint crept
underneath out of sight, got in the middle
just where the white should be, even though you'd kept
it all still. Was 'capillary action' did
that. You weren't responsible. It hadn't slid.
'BUTCHERS'
We played 'Butchers'. You took off your pyjamas
and lay naked across the other's naked
lap. The 'Butcher' would saw hard at the martyr's
limbs and hang all the lovely joints up for sale,
calling out the prices. The truncated
one was tickled pink, giggling whether female
or male, helpless with laughter, knowing it could
do the same in a moment, pleased with either
being 'Butcher' or 'Meat'. A lovely childhood
game it was. As for Mammy, Daddy, — neither
of them knew, couldn't guess, would probably fuss —
anyway, wouldn't want to pretend, like us.
THE STICK MAN
Had an old many-paged diary. I drew
on each page the same stick man. Each time I changed
him a little. Each action was so slight you
couldn't tell he's been moved. I had to keep him
naked — too many clothes couldn't be arranged
so the movement stayed smooth. He was in a gym
doing athletic exercises, standing
on his head, doing forward and backward rolls.
He did best with a boulder: jumped up, landing
on it as it rolled bumping over the holes.
He fell off and it squashed him. But he would rise
quite unharmed and continue his exercise.
FILM-BOOK
Used to draw little men down in the corner.
Hymn-books had plenty of pages. Each altered
just a bit, the arm raised, the distance shorter
just by a fraction between this leg and that,
or a face with the mouth in a bad-tempered
scowl that could rise to a real smile at
someone telling a joke, but you had to draw
each tiny second of movement that the face
didn't know about. Then you finally saw
all of the pictures together. Was a race
to the end, flicking pages. The stick-man knew
what to do, and the face really smiled at you.
SENSITIVE PAPER
It was sensitive paper. Put it in the sun,
slowly it darkened, so you could put a flower
with it, framed under glass, and soon it was done.
Had to immerse it in special solution
(cost a lot, though). After about an hour
there was a picture. Then you could abandon
the real flower, get a picture frame. You could use
it as a decoration. In the winter
when all the flowers were gone, you would still have views
there of the summer, white ghosts, though not proper
flowers, with black all around them. Yet they would last
and you know they were real once, back there in the past.
PLAYING AT 'PRISONERS'
We were playing at 'Prisoners', really tying
up. The game was more fun. You didn't quite know
when he tied you up how long you'd be crying
for release or for rescue, but, though you seemed
to be fighting, you let him do it and go
off for more of your side, unless they redeemed
you. And you didn't mind the bondage at first.
To be trussed was a trust. Though the cording hurt
you, the helplessness calmed you, until a thirst
stuck, an itch maddened. As I lay in the dirt,
with a grass stripped of seed he tickled my nose,
and soon I was shouting to do as I chose.
MAH-JONGG (II)
All the Wrights played Mah-Jongg. Scented cedar,
polished ivory, regal dragons, white chips
that were money — not real, you would need a
lot to match all the red and black dots that meant
hundreds, thousands. My uncle would give me tips
on just what to collect. Had to watch what went
and what came, how the wall fell, when to call
'Pung!' and 'Kang!' Flower-pots looked nice, but only
scored in money-games. Mammy, though, would forestall
all suggestions: 'It's betting!' Wasn't holy
to use money for games. The clever winners,
even Chinese, with money became sinners.
THE CARDS
Saw the cards as a kingdom. There was the King,
drawn with a funny flat crown and a curly
moustache; he wore stiff robes with zig-zagging
stripes and posh ermine, and his feet were his own
face too. The Queen had a Salvation Army
hat, and the Knave held a stubby sword — the throne
wasn't his. Numbers were subjects, all in their ranks,
wearing their suits like a livery. The tens
so broad-shouldered, the twos so poor. There were blanks
so, if you lost one, you kept your citizens.
But the Ace was a puzzle: the least, yet the best.
Was a sort of a god. With One, you were blest.
PATIENCE
Used to wonder about the games of Patience.
Daddy had bought special little cards, very
neat, two packs, both edged with gold, the difference
being their colour, red and green. Wouldn't spread
too far over the table. Games a-plenty
there in a little book. You could go ahead
and play 'Tower of Hanoy', 'Miss Milligan',
'Royal Parade', but you had no opponent —
you were playing against chance. Had the option
either to go this way or that, to consent
or refuse. It was fate tried to cheat your gaze.
You were threading your way through a secret maze.
CALLING 'MISÈRE'
In the game 'Solo Whist' you could call 'Misère'.
It was a French word meaning poverty. You
had to lose all the time, and that was quite fair —
losing meant winning. It was like what the priest said,
you'd to lose life to gain it. The others knew.
They all tried hard to get you to score. You shed
all your high cards whenever you could: then they
couldn't lay traps for you. It was nice to see
all the feeble cards make the strong ones give way,
all because they were too strong. Was strategy,
like in Judo, you use his force to be first.
Where he thought he was best, you show he was worst.
THE OTHER GAME WITH DOMINOES
I would play with the dominoes, placed upright
all in a line — you've done it, too — and then knock
down the first and then gleefully trace the sight
up to the end of the change from standing
safe to lying down flat. The titupping shock
flowed like a wave through them all, each one handing
on the failure to stay so quickly that you
never could catch them doing it. All you saw
was the black serpent crawling on that you knew
you had let out of its pit. Something like awe
made you cold seeing safe ones going to cop it,
so that sometimes I'd grab the snake and stop it.
ANOTHER GAME WITH CHESSMEN
Chessmen needn't play chess. The knights could be knights
galloping over the carpet plain. The Kings
and the Queens would be watching from the smooth heights
raised by the Cushiony Mountains. And the pawns
could be archers or infantrymen, as wings
ready to charge as soon as they heard the horns
that would sound from the castles. All the dying,
they could have Extreme Unction delivered by
bishops, better than priests. It was exciting!
Victory over the Blacks! You'd see them fly
to the hearth and its ashes. Wonderful scenes!
And in this game the Kings were stronger than Queens.
PLAYING HALMA
In the Battle of Halma the sides couldn't
see each other for fog. A good name, I thought,
for the game. Though you passed his piece, you wouldn't
take it. Leap-frogging over him you had to
get to Home first. The trick was not to get caught
with no chain to jump over. He could stop you
with a block. He could break his own chain to spite
you. But sometimes a chain of my men and his
served us both, and we'd leave it, glad to unite
for a while even though we were enemies.
But you'd never be sure, just as in a war,
what he's do. It was like a word or a law.
NOUGHTS AND CROSSES AS A GAME
Got to feel with the game of Noughts and Crosses,
playing it over and over again, that,
if you knew all the moves, your gains and losses
wouldn't mean anything: Walter and I would
be like parts of a clock, with the moves off pat;
there would be only one way to go. You could
not shout 'I am the winner!' or feel bothered
losing. Would be the same with chess if we had
minds like gods. Funny that — the whole game mattered
only because our memory couldn't add
up the moves. Won by guess or by accident.
You enjoyed it because you were ignorant.
FILLING IN SQUARES
We would play at the pencil-and-paper game
where on a sheet with some dots in squares you had
to draw lines to connect them up, and your aim
was to complete a square, but, as well as that,
you'd to stop your opponent too. It was bad
if you were foolish: he could just do it pat
'cause you'd left him the chance. One thing was funny:
sometimes you drew lines very roughly, didn't
make them reach to the dot, or they were fuzzy.
Therefore they weren't really squares — some accident
had prevented them being ideal. But who cares?
Didn't stop us from playing. We chose to see squares.
BATTLESHIPS
Often Walter and I played Battleships. We
played the intelligent way, where you number
all your volleys, which means that a strategy
has to be worked out. You can calculate where
you might shoot and he might. I used to wonder
where in the world all those 'mights' were, in the air,
not on paper. We fancied them on no place,
calling them 'possibilities', and you had
to find some way of proving them nothing, race
him in this popping them out. A sort of mad
game with things that weren't there to find things that were.
Was like life 'cause you don't know what can occur.
ONE WAY WOULDN'T FIT
One time Walter and I had found it a bind
playing at ordinary Battleships, so
we invented a three-dimensional kind.
'Stead of the ten-by-ten 'sea', we had a cube
five-by-five-by five. All the 'ships' of your foe,
all yours, were scattered through it. Some were a tube
that was vertical, horizontal, even
right as diagonal corner to corner.
Numbers, letters and Greek letters for shots. When
we both tried the T-shaped aircraft-carrier,
though, one way wouldn't fit. Funny — we set rules,
but the maths had already decreed us fools.
MEN
If you played Draughts, your men were fat and tubby,
made of wood: still, you could order them about.
Playing Halma, each man had a round dummy
head: you could lift him by it. In chess a knight
was a horse or a horse was a knight without
either his hooves or his toes, but he moved right
with your fingers as you knew the game.
If you played Nine Men's Morris with marbles, you
could still count heads and chop them off just the same,
if they were his. And in Battleships, you knew
you had men in the submarine going down.
There's no point in the game unless they can drown.
WAR GAMES
We'd rule squares on the Ordnance Survey map of
Horwich, Lancs. There were cardboard counters we'd made.
Some were black with a swastika. From above
you could see all the ones in red-white-and-blue
falling back. Stars-and-stripes would come to their aid.
We depended on dice, even though we knew
at the start who the winner was. The German
had a chance in the middle: the dice counted
for more shots then, but later, ammunition,
as agreed, ran out. Strong allies surmounted
the worst failure. Before, we'd gone on too long —
only because our calculations were wrong.
BOMBING
We would draw on a piece of paper two maps,
each of a big town, with Town Hall and railway
station, factories, barracks, bridges, perhaps
two or three. Everything scored: ten for direct
hits, and five at the side; twenty if it lay
next to the ammunition dump. Then we checked
that we had just the same. Then they were pinned down
flat on a plank. Then you took the dart in
turn and bombed from a height the enemy's town.
Found that your hand and your eye would make you win.
The destruction proved you were better at
judging distances, times, anything like that.
HANGMAN
There were lines for the spaces of the letters.
But already you knew how many there were.
That was fixed by the other, for the guessers
didn't know what the word was. Only he read
how the number was right. As the labeller
of the blanks, he could see what was in his head
on the same lines you could see. You would say
first the vowels — he had to use some, but one
or two wasn't much clue. Mistakes you would pay
for with upright and cross-tree. Made it more fun
as your chances ran out. Your consonants clanged
out your body and legs. You were finally hanged.
THE WHITE CARDS IN TOTOPOLY
There were white cards in Totopoly which no one
wanted. White, they were. Stood for 'Disadvantage'.
White like snow or like bones. Horses could not run
if you had those. No passing the winning-post
even if you had 'Flamenco', and 'Forage
Merchant' brought you a lot of money. Hindmost
horses couldn't move forward when good luck came.
I was playing with Den and Eric, and four
or five white cards were piled by my place. The game
was turned over. The race began. 'You had more
than four!' 'He had five!' 'No — six!' 'You can go!'
You're a cheat!' In my bones I felt cold as snow.
THE TROUBLE OF WINNING FIRST
If you won in a game of 'Snakes-and-Ladders',
it was boring to watch the others if they
went on. Then, all the grim cobras and adders
became pictures, and only window-cleaners
went up ladders. If I suggested they play
falling down ladders, going up snakes (seen as
friends who'd slide you much higher than you should be),
they all snapped, 'Oh, it's all right for you — you've won!'
To be first at the '64' set you free
from the effort, but made you feel you'd been done
out of something, as if you couldn't but choose,
whatever you did, to be winner and lose.
MAKING UP YOUR OWN GAMES
After playing Monopoly, it was fun
trying to make up our own. Took a big sheet
and traced out a long track to where you'd begun.
Judges gave Fines. Your car was 'Laid Up'. Letters
told you Good News or Bad. 'Road Up' down that street,
'By-pass' for some. Extravagance made Debtors:
with a Pools Win you were several streets ahead,
no sweat to you. A Lawyer would give advice
that was no use but cost a lot. An Unread
Meter resulted in a huge bill. The Price
had no discount. The snag was, we weren't clever:
for some reason the Game went on for ever.
WALTER AND CHARLES AT GAMES
I liked Walter because when you played a game,
even a mind-bender like chess, it always
seemed just fun. Losing, winning it was the same.
Laughed yourself silly and sillier, joining
in an opera made from the Marseillaise,
'San Min Chu Ee' and 'The Stars and Stripes', knowing
you were going to lose your queen. He would play
on the piano the 'Honky-Tonk Train Blues',
'Clair de Lune' and Tchaikovsky in the same way
whether you'd checkmated or him. But to lose
when you played with Charles, he'd be in a sweat
with glee, and, if you won, would never forget.
AN ARGUMENT
We had read Conan Doyle about mediums,
spirits and 'ectoplasm', about people
making ghosts from their ears in deliriums,
tappings, ouija boards. We tried out the board
for a bit of fun, knowing it was piffle.
Charles, though, would argue it wasn't. Thought he scored
one against us when he was the only one
saying there might be something in it. Science
didn't know or explain the phenomenon.
Brains were peculiar. Had to have patience,
and be humble. To mock at it, that was small.
But we knew that he didn't believe at all.
DUCK-RABBITS
There's a duck and a rabbit in the same picture.
With a drake or a goose or even a hen
put beside it, it's duck, but, if you stick a
hole behind it, or, better, a fox or a trap,
it is rabbit again. An old woman when
you put her right in front of a handsome chap
becomes beautiful young lady, but she won't
with a broomstick. There's also one of Voltaire —
if you like him, it's him: a skull if you don't.
If you like naked ladies, you'll see them there
in the photo with Dali: they're a skull too
if you don't. Looks as if it depends on you.
'CHERCHEZ ET VOUS TROUVEREZ'
There were comical pictures with a caption:
'Cherchez et vous trouverez'. Always someone
had lost something: somewhere around the maiden
hid in the picture her brother and her nurse
(in her skirts, in her ribbons). There was one swan
missing of four, but if you were to reverse
how you looked, you would see it there in outline
shaped in the sky between two of the others.
And Goliath was grinning in a design
right inside David's shield. There were more wonders
to be found: since I searched very hard for traces,
where I knew there were none, I found some faces.
TRICK PICTURES (I)
In the picture were fishes or animals,
gnomes or witches. You had to turn it upside
down or sideways to find them. They were puzzles:
what was cloud could be tiger ready to jump
just as soon as you saw it; what you relied
on as branches hid wolves in the crotch. That bump
on the trunk was an open mouth if you looked
in a new way. That bush by the little boy's
leg had eyes and a set of teeth. You were hooked
by a fish on the land. Those birds were decoys
for a witch in the sky. She said fear was fun.
When you found out them all, you knew you had won.
TRICK PICTURES (II)
There were pictures that, if you looked from the right,
girls wore a pretty dress — look from the left and
they were nude. Mammy said that kind of sight
naughty men liked, and she would laugh a funny
way and then try to brush it out with her hand,
just as if with a rubber. 'But their money
is all wasted,' she said. The triangular
slats on the adverts turn every minute
making money for someone. A circular
picture shows King Charles — a shiny tube must fit
in the middle or all those smears can't portray.
Everything must be looked at in the right way.
EASY PICTURES
If you joined up the numbers, you would draw a
picture without knowing it, all of angles
but that hadn't to matter — you still saw a
horse or a house. On this waxy paper you'd
press a sharp rod and scribble circles, spirals
just where you liked to, but if you thought you'd
made a mess of the pattern, all you had to
do was to peel off the paper and then start
with a clean sheet. On that blank a picture grew
under your hand as you rubbed: it wasn't art
but you thought you had done it, not art because
it was moving the pencil yourself that was.
TRANSFORMATIONS
When you put the white paper in the chemical,
in a while the faint outlines of the flower
you had pressed would appear. With heat the scribble
you had done with invisible ink grew brown
as a manuscript. As an advert in our
uncle's window a face with its mouth turned down
would be grinning at you after you'd gone by.
Just with water your brush made lovely colour,
but the picture was not yours. And with one eye
closed, the photo looked real — how much duller
it became with both open. A stereoscope
cost a lot, but the world was solid with hope.
TRICKY THINGS
I could play with my pen: it had a barrel
and a stock and a trigger. And I could drive
with my eggcup around the kitchen table:
it had pot wheels, the radiator was blurred
under glaze, but my egg would do as a live
motor-racing man. There was a ladybird
that would rub out mistakes, and I could sharpen
up my pencil inside a globe. A wise owl
could be switched on a night, and a skeleton
was a fob. A soap angel would wash all foul
dirt away. It was nice to have things double:
what they didn't turn out to be was useful.
OBJECTS FROM THE MAGIC-SHOP
On the page was a blot made of celluloid
you could lift off. The vampire teeth wouldn't bite:
you could bite them instead. You could be decoyed
by a chocolate bar that buzzed when you picked
it up, but that glistening dog-dirt was quite
safe to handle — you saw how you had been tricked.
There were spiders of harmless hair, and a worm
made of rubber. He hadn't lost a finger,
and his nose wasn't swollen. It made you squirm
when they blindfolded you: they said they'd bring a
dead eye, but it was just a skinned tomato.
You could learn from these things a fine bravado.
MATCHINGS
If you follow the numbers with your pencil,
you will see that a real face will come through.
You could draw funny pictures with your stencil,
such as trees coming out of the roof, or a
man with three legs. Puppets — you could unscrew
a girl's head and put on that of a soldier,
put a head on a hand, a hand on a head.
And that game with cards just like Consequences:
what a joke when you dressed the body instead
with a skirt underneath His Eminence's
wig! But winners knew which ones they had to get —
Happy Families must make a perfect set.
REVERSED MAP
Saw the outline map (Britain) as inside out.
All that was land was now lake, and all the sea
became land. If you stood high in a lookout
right at the end of the Severn Peninsula,
you could see the Great Gulf of Wales, and a free
all-round view, wide as the world, to India
Thames, Lake Wight, and the Forth of Devon. Only
all the big bays of Scotland were out of sight.
I would like to have sailed then to that lonely
headland, the Wash, with its limestone caves, and might
cross the Isthmus of Menai, with Cortez-stare.
Why was nowhere so wondrous, and not somewhere?
MIMING GAMES
We played miming games. You had to choose a phrase
or a quotation. Word by word you acted
till they got it. For All , open arms sideways
and the nothing between them would stand for it.
For the world turn and turn till it contracted
onto you as the centre. Is you could fit
as a 'small word' between your finger and thumb
(wasn't easy to act). A stage could confuse
all the audience for you had to become
just the very thing you didn't want to choose
since actors must act to escape the booing.
But by then they should guess what you are doing.
BIKE INTO MOTOR-BIKE
If you folded a cigarette-case up small,
squeezed it beside your brakes, you could imagine
you were riding a noisy motor-bike all
up and down Vale Avenue. You saw people
turning round at the sudden buzzing. You'd win
trophies in TT races. You'd be equal-
first or first always even though nobody
else was against you. Around the Plantation
was a hundred miles, new each time. Your wobbly
tracks were the hairpin bends: each time you'd taken
them so close all the bushes had shouted "Ooo!"
At the end all the prizes were just for you.
PULLING FACES
With your thumbs in the corners of your mouth you
pulled out as hard as you dared. With your fingers
you pulled down on your lower eyelids. Said 'Boo!'
You could tell that some didn't like it, and so
did it again, though it hurt a little. Squinters
always made people laugh. I could do it, though
you went dizzy from seeing double. Maybe
holding the world like that would make your eyes stick.
Pulling tongues out was rude. You could only see
it at the tip — Suppose it became so thick
it got jammed in your teeth so you could never
draw it back. People wouldn't like you ever.
SCARY FACES
In the dark with a torch under the chin they
could very easily frighten you. You knew
it was them all the time, but they'd found a way,
some kind of special finding from some special
kind of place where these so ugly faces grew,
waiting to pop out and scare you from a tunnel
where they hid underneath. You could be out in
sunshine, but somewhere they were still waiting and
they'd been there ever since you were born, would grin,
ever so sure they could make you jump, could land
right in front of you any time and shout 'Boo!'
in your face, and you knew them as they knew you.
SPINNING A COIN
Spun a coin. Was a marble at first, made of
coppery shadow and gleam, twisted inside,
perfect sphere for a time. Almost afraid of
when it began to slow down with a tiny
hole on top; in the sheen a gap growing wide.
Sphere now a humming diabolo, shiny
goblet spun out of seconds, with a spiral
chasing of fire plaited with fresh-chestnut rings.
But the hum became wavering wave, idle,
dizzy on-noddings downwards, mad incurlings
that went whining in mania up the scale,
till it buzzed to the silence of head or tail.
JIGSAW PUZZLE
In the house an expensive jigsaw puzzle.
Only allowed to play with it now and then.
All in plywood, the pieces in subtle
shapes, more like spiral shells or ears than all those
made of cardboard. A dark painting, so that, when
starting to play, you couldn't know what you chose.
Was it reeds by the lake or the trees behind?
Was it the monks' habits or the dark shadow
by the bank? And the clear sky — so hard to find
which part was which. But Daddy had done it so
many times that he knew. To do it alone
would be best. Couldn't do it, though, on our own.
SOLVING THE PUZZLES
There were puzzles in comics. There'd be a maze.
Looked like a wasps' nest cut open. You had to
wriggle this way and that, although you always
found the obvious route ended up at
a wall. When you had learned it, though, and you knew
how to avoid being tricked, was funny that
it was no use to play any more. You'd got
safe to the treasure-chest, but the game vanished.
They had pictures the same, side by side, but not
twins of each other. Guess where! But I banished
all the fun when I found if you squinted one
to the other, you saw them at once. You'd won.
THE DUDENEY PUZZLES
In the Dudeney books there were so many
puzzles: the matches that had to be moved so
you had only two triangles left; the penny
under the piles of shillings that could never
cover more than two shillings but had to go
right from one end to the other; the clever
train and the bridges that it could only cross
once; and the prisoners with their two questions.
Were all traps with a trick. Would be at a loss
always unless you weren't led by illusions.
You suspected the expected for a clue —
the most obvious thing the last thing to do.
OPPOSITES
Making pictures of flowers with daylight paper,
I would think that it's just as much a picture
of the sun. When you ruled a line, it gave a
kind of sign of the ruler. When you painted
with a brush, what you saw wasn't a figure
but the places that the brush had been. The shaded
circles under my buttons were a photo
of my days in the open. On the record
what those squiggles engraved, translated, would show
all the lessons those players had had. You scored
in the game what was scored — Who was the chooser?
Doesn't matter, but here's cheers for the loser!
MAZES
In a maze were temptations like what father
Moylan would talk about. If you went down what
seemed the easiest way instead of farther
round, through a zigzag directly towards Home,
could be sure that the brick-pattern ways would not
let you through. You would have to start to roam
here and there as you should have done right away
(having retraced the path to Start). For your eye
had to be one ahead of your pen. To play
games with a maze was like at school when you try
to write poetry — verses were hard to climb.
Some would twist up a sentence to fit a rhyme.
THE UNCLE'S PARTY-PIECE
At the party an uncle of Kevin's stood
with his legs apart, leaning forward. Lino
on the floor. Then he mooed. His meaning I could
not see. Playing cards dropped from behind — flop! flap!
There were hoots of delight. That I was so slow
they saw. Wide open eyes, like cows', made a trap
all around me. 'Oh, doesn't he know? Do it
again, Uncle, do!' Flap! flop! flap! Down they fell.
But I wouldn't see now, I wouldn't admit
to the 'vulgar' noise, words that brought feel and smell
much too close, too close. 'Don't you see it's the same?'
I was safe as long as I withheld the name.
SOMEONE'S UNCLE WHO JOKED
He would come up behind you. His hands would slide
through under your armpits. You had to leave
your arms down. With a dressing-gown he could hide
right inside, so they couldn't tell he was there
though the arms were so big. 'Nothing up my sleeve!'
he would say, showing arms that had more hair
than mine. I'd watch him scratch at an itch that I
didn't have on my nose, not rubbing the one
in my eye that I did. I'd watch his hands try
to cut food on an empty plate, lifting none
to my mouth. Didn't like it. You knew they'd say
'Spoil-sport!' if you said, 'But I don't want to play!'
GASLIGHT BY PATRICK HAMILTON, HORWICH LITTLE THEATRE, PERFORMED AT THE VICTORIA METHODIST SCHOOL, SATURDAY, MAY 17th, 1947 AT 7.15 P.M.
Mrs. Manningham's husband tried to make her
think she was mad so he could put her away
and get on with his searching. He knew there were
jewels concealed somewhere, jewels he had killed
for, some seven long years ago. In the play,
while he was out, the gaslight grew dim. What thrilled
me, though, sitting enthralled in Victoria
Methodists dark hall, was the actress who took
Mrs. Manningham: shocking hysteria;
cowering beautiful victim, who could look
with such hope at the steady inspector —
Couldn't think that it was Sarah, my sister.
THE BAD ACTORS
When we played at charades at Christmas there were
some of the people you found couldn't act.
There were some were just shy, their parts a blur,
rushing as fast as they could to get away
out of sight, and they couldn't make eye-contact,
for, if they did, they just giggled. To play
someone else seemed to frighten them. And then some
others, they acted, but all stiffly. They tried
much too hard, and their arm movements would become
awkward like railway signals. Wanted to hide
themselves, locked up inside. Like scarecrows they'd try
to be real just as if to act was a lie.
THE UNCLE'S SHADOW-PLAY
With one hand, sometimes two, and a single bright
light, he could cast shadows of all sorts of things
on a wall. It was odd in your direct sight
having this uncle grinning with his fingers
and his hands all so twisted and fixed in rings,
knobs, bends and funny gestures like a dancer's,
and in front of you there on the wall a cat,
purring so loud though it was just a shadow,
or a camel that made a spitting noise that
really was his noise, or a cock that could crow
or a lion that roared. Course it couldn't bite.
All the same it still gave you a little fright.
HARRY MARKHAM
Harry Markham spoke Lancashire dialect.
He was so funny telling us jokes. They were
so much funnier heard with all the correct
vowels and consonants for our Lancashire —
'advenchoor' for 'adventure'. 'smook' for 'smoke', 'childer',
'children', and 'thowt' for 'thought'. Seemed good to hear
his pronouncing of any word. He didn't
speak so broad normally, and I thought it sad
we all thought it so odd. Was really ancient,
special to Bolton, but now history had
swept it off to a Little Theatre, cheering
as a joke, but as echo, disappearing.
ONE OF HARRY MARKHAM'S JOKES
All the people down South were softies and stuck
up. In the North everyone was friends to us.
Called you 'Love' up here: down there people said 'Duck'.
That was so silly. Might as well say 'Goose'. Heard
Harry Markham tell jokes about Southerners.
Once was a London sparrow, a cheeky bird
with a cockney voice, wasn't thinking one day,
found itself trapped in a railway carriage at
Euston. Got taken to Manchester. Saw a grey
bird in the station roof. Said, 'Oi!' But it sat
silent. 'Sparrers are friendlee! No' a snob
in Lannon!' the sparrow said. — 'Ah'm a robin!'
HARRY HUMPHREYS (I)
Harry Humphreys grabbed the bells and
shook them and shouted 'Ninotchtka! Ninotschka!'
Took a pinch of powder, out with his hand,
scattering, whispering in elaborate aside
'Snowshky!' We wept and staggered with laughter.
Lantern-jawed, spectacles goggling thick, a wide
toothy mouth, he became the Little Theatre
Fernandel. Next to the dressing-room, commotions
(the old toilet gurgling so loud) — 'WhatEVAH
are you doing in THAH?' (cod-Edith-Evans).
But his wife had died young. Voice like a tuba,
he would, gesturing, sing 'Vesta la giubba!'
HARRY HUMPHREYS (II)
Mrs. Storey had told me a tale of our
jester, our ugly Pagliacci. In spite
of his face he pursued a pretty girl, flower
everyone wondered at. One day the eager
Harry sought to waylay her. To his delight
there she was, out, alone, and he must seize a
chance that offered itself. She was pushing a
pram for a neighbour, looking after the child
for a while. So he joined her, beginning a
faltering plea. He thought that at least she'd smiled,
but then, suddenly, came a voice in outrage
from a woman: 'The two of you! At your age!'
THE BEAUTIFUL GIRL AT THE LITTLE THEATRE
To see Dorothy Brimelow was to see
film-starry beauty: golden hair, china-doll face,
blue eyes, long lashes. All knew she was lovely;
she knew it too. I just couldn't help a glance
but made sure that she didn't notice in case
I would be put in her moth-book. Looked askance
when I found that her acting was weak. It seemed
such a relief — you could find something to save
yourself falling in love. So nothing redeemed
her for me. Beauty, I thought, mustn't enslave.
I was brought up short, though. An aircraft crash dealt
death to her. Couldn't know what it was I felt.
THE SELF-PLAYING VIOLIN
Yes, we amused them with Dandy Dick, John Wardle
vague for the Dean, Harry Humphreys the mock-
loyal Blore, his Haitches in place; moping, doleful
Tarver, the major; the groom Hatcham, who thought
Dandy's burnt tail 'inciderism'; the block
Noah Topping, jealous of 'is 'Annah. Sport,
though, of chance, were the laughs from the audience.
Playing a silent violin as Darby,
I was caught by a button, thanks to science,
pressed by Sheba the pianist, a barmy
system to warn the player off-stage. It played
in its case! Was a laugh that we hadn't made.
BACKGAMMON
Daddy made a backgammon board, and little
black and white men. You soon learned that the numbers
on the dice were to you a kind of riddle
'cause they could mean different things depending
what you made of them. To add them together,
move one man forward might mean that you're spending
a good chance somewhere else, even though it looked
good. And you really had to try to do two,
even three things at once, because if you hooked
one of his men out of the way but got through
to a safe place yourself, that was fine. A game
seems, depends on making double your aim.
AFTER REHEARSALS
The best part of rehearsals at the Little
Theatre wasn't what you'd think, having fun
while you acted nor all the happy gabble
filling the dressing-rooms — it was when you got
home at half-past ten. You at once had to run
all through the evening's doings while they were hot,
because Mammy and Daddy and us as well
couldn't have thought of going to bed without
it — had to tell them when the mantelpiece fell
into the room in the love scene, Harry's shout
'Tickets, please!' as he passed through the crowd again...
Was as if all the fun wasn't done till then.
REWARDS
The magnetic fish rose to your magnet bait.
With plain water your magic brush painted red
and green flowers and fairies. You could rotate
the hour hand and the minute hand to any
time you liked. Goggle-eyes was a gingerbread
man: you bit off his ugly head. A penny
could be turned into all-sorts. Though the cracker
made a bang, you got toys, or at least a crown.
In the pudding was sixpence. Didn't matter
if you weren't lucky — Uncle would slide one down
his sleeve. Party masks gave you some surprises:
there were always smiles under the disguises.