Dispersal

Deep in the dark pool
At the edge of Romney marsh
Tench nudge the airman
Fallen from the sky a lifetime
Ago still dreaming of Dymchurch
And the jolly barmaid at the Rose
The chaps at the mess would be
Glancing at his empty chair and
Wondering if they would be next;
A perch flicked his tattered parachute
Which had not opened properly;
His Hurricane was twenty feet down
In the mudflats at Hythe
His fiancée had married
A motor trader and moved to
Basingstoke where she still
Thought of him every day
In her nineties such lovely
Hands those long sensitive
Fingers sending hot lead
Into German skulls and
Stroking her tenderly
In the narrow bedroom
A halfcrown gleamed in
The dark water as an eel
Rubbed against it
He had slipped a ten
Bob note into his
Breast pocket at dispersal;
It was a gift from his aunt
For his twentyfirst
Birthday the day
Before he was shot
Down but it soon
Disintegrated
It was bad luck
That the ME109
Managed to get
Off the round before
It exploded in a
Hop field at Whitstable
Rotten luck