The Grampound Times

Spring 2009 (Edition 50)
Our community in Cornwall

The Grampound Times
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Two of my favourites come together in this next item.   The first is the old B.B.C Television programme  “Dad’s Army” and the second is our Cornish poet   DAVID PROWSE..
As this is the 50th edition of “The Grampound Times” I include this poem selfishly for my pleasure, but I hope yours also.   The poem is entitled…

SILLY OLD GODFREY

By David Prowse

To us, he was silly old Godfrey
And a scapegoat of innocent fun
But an integral part of Dad’s Army
And fiction endearingly spun.

Out of place as a soldier was Godfrey
Ever willing, but often confused
His endurance restricted by nature
And the need to be briefly excused.

Arnold Ridley would play to perfection
That bumbler so gently demeaned
Only now do inquiries inform us
That Arnold was not what he seemed.

For he’d served in the hell of the trenches
Almost died in the havoc and haze
And the wounds he would carry from battle
Would be with him the rest of his days.

But he’d lock them away with his medals
And bury the past in a shroud
Like whispers of time-honoured secrets
That should never be spoken aloud.

And isn’t it true of so many
Of Arnold’s impeccable grain
That they choose not to speak of their suffering
And allow no disclosure of pain.

They don’t wear the mantle of martyrs
Or swagger their way through the pack
It’s as though they were bonded in silence
To the buddies who never came back.

We see grey, wispy straggles and wrinkles
Of old men who shuffle along
Wile their mettle and measure lie hidden
In the pages we find when they’re gone.

When I next smile away my vexations
In the drill-hall with Mainwaring’s men
I’ll be looking at silly old Godfrey
And he’ll never seem silly again.


 

 

 


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