I’m climbing the huge, ancient pear tree behind my birthplace,
that was felled who knows how long ago. My mother
will complain mildly; my father will rage, his voice
suddenly violent, using his words like a bullwhip.
The tree, every branch, every leaf, is shrouded black
from a thousand foundries, forges and coal pits.
I breathe the smoke and grit that pours out of them
with the nails and the chains, the ingots and the coal.
As I climb, I know the tree’s black pall of dirt will cover me
and I know the consequence. My mother, who will wash my clothes,
restore me to respectability, will be sadly forgiving;
my father’s fury will rage on her behalf.
But I won’t forgo the climbing.
So here I am again, who knows how many decades later.
The grime is on my clothes and on my skin
and in my hair. I feel the grit in my mouth and in my eyes.
I pick one of the vanished tree’s stunted fruit and bite hard
into the memory. It tastes of factory chimneys and foundry slag.
I love the taste. I love the smells. I love the brutal labour
that flames and chokes across the blackened country.
As I start to climb again I look up through the soot-crusted leaves
and there among them is that lovely old hypocrite, my father.
The dirt is in his hair and on his face and on his hands.
He is a branch or two above me, and he is climbing.