The Boating Park

It’s thirty years since I travelled back

To wander my childhood home,

To check out the trees I used to climb

And the fields where I used to roam,

I remembered the friends that used to play,

Wendy and Paul and Mark,

And the local bully that had his way

Back then, in the Boating Park.

 

We’d go up there on a Sunday, pay

Our money and hire a boat,

That fourpence each to the gatekeeper

Saw the four of us afloat,

Each boat had paddlewheels either side

You could turn, and stop or start,

Or spin around in a circle, just

For fun, at the Boating Park.

 

The Park, laid out in a rectangle

Took an hour to paddle round,

Once out of sight of the gatekeeper

The banks would muffle the sound,

We’d scream and shriek and laugh and beam

As we rammed each other’s boats,

I often thought it a wonder that

We didn’t puncture the floats.

 

Then over beyond the halfway mark

We lay in the shade of trees,

The sun would sink, it was getting dark

And we’d hear the murmur of bees,

We had to pass there under a bridge

And duck, for the bridge was low,

And that’s where the bully McPherson stood

On the bridge, those years ago.

 

He’d jeer, throw stones and catcall as we

Tried to get under the span,

Then climb and drop into Wendy’s boat

He wouldn’t have tried with a man.

He’d paddle over the further side

And make her get out of the boat,

Then paddle it back the way we came

Get out, and leave it afloat.

 

One Sunday I sat under the bridge

With Paul and Mark beside,

While Wendy came along on her own

As if on a solo ride,

The bully tried the very same thing

But we each pulled on his coat,

And when he came up, he couldn’t scream

For the water lodged in his throat.

 

He splashed about and he tried to grab

The boat, but his clothes, like lead,

Were trying to drag him down, while Paul

And Mark, they stood on his head.

Wendy had clambered up on the bank

Controlled, and well in command,

For every time he tried to get out,

She’d stamp and stomp on his hand.

 

The paper said it was very strange

That he must have put up a fight,

But hadn’t the strength to pull himself

Up out of the cut that night.

His hands and fingers were shredded, where

He’d tried to climb up the bank,

But the weight of his heavy, sodden clothes

Were the demons he had to thank.

 

I went to visit the Boating Park

It was just the way I feared,

I met up there with an older Mark,

A man with a greying beard,

He told me Wendy and Paul were dead

Weighed down with a sense of sin,

And the gatekeeper at the Boating Park

Had gone, when they filled it in.

 

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[Linda Marie Van Tassell]

I loved the storyline and the bully got his just desserts. Kind of sad though ... it reminds me of a local pool that was filled in decades ago because women were giving birth to unwanted babies that they would drown in the pool. That concrete pool is surrounded by a stone wall, over which stands a beautiful old church. Murder right beside the House of the Lord. Go figure!

[Tom]

An epic tale and glad to see justice was executed to a satisfactory outcome !

[Strider Marcus Jones]

Brilliant poem. I find myself looking back too now and finding people and places gone. Into my library/favourites. 100/100

[roarke]

time fills in everything. Going back to visit old memories is a double edged sword at times. Many instances I fail to see any forward in the changes. This poem calls out to the memories and events lurking in all readers. I had a nice time here.

[Marie]

I've never been to a boating partk sounds like fun.

Bullies get what they deserve...no e had a reason to geel guilty...

[Keith]

Man those vivid image of the boating park and kids mucking up as soon as out of sight brought back some memories here. Another great tale.