DRAWING THE FIRE... (My new poem about being a child in a house with coal fires, 1950s & being punished for trying to help...)

 Drawing The Fire…

HOW IT WAS DONE, BACK IN THE DAY...

The fire in the kitchen was lit, certainly

But the flames hadn’t yet begun to envelop

The black lumps of coal and scattered slack.

My grandmother had just been washing by hand 

And had gathered it up to carry it out to the wringer in the yard,

Before hanging the clothes out on a rope line in the fresh winter air…

The fire in the kitchen had attracted me, certainly

But those flames still hadn’t begun to develop,

So the coarse black coal and its smoking lack

Of warmth needed my eager helping hand.

Taking a page from a large newspaper, I held it hard

Against the fireplace and drew it away to cause a draught and fan the fire, without a care…  

“Peter, what are you doing!” Nan yelled, returning to the house,

Pulling me back from the fire and snatching the newspaper page

Away from me. “Just you wait ’til your dad gets home…” she bellowed

At me, as I was led away wondering what wrong I had done…

It became a worrying afternoon, for I dreaded my father’s grouse

And sure enough, he berated me, held my hand near the fire in his rage,

Then smacked it hard, so that I suffered the heat too, whilst in my tears I wallowed.

A punishment severe and a lesson learnt from a strict father by a quiet son…

Pete Ray

17th November 2024…

Strangely, I guess I was punished for trying to help. 

‘Drawing the fire’ was what my mum and nan did quite often to quicken the effect of the coal fire.

The cold 1950s winters were just that.

The house was in Ward End, Birmingham.

I have always been wary of flames, hesitant near them too.

I wonder why…