May 1945 - March 2015.

That morning I asked my mother,
"Why have the big bangs stopped?"
I was barely two years old
And accustomed to the noise of war,
North London`s V2 Alley
Just a mile or two away.

She did not answer;
She was busy assessing the qualities
of the sudden, new found quietness,
The soft mellow buzz of the summer.
She was listening out intently
For the terror that never came.

She had once before known peace,
But all my life I had listened to gunfire,
The staccato crack of aircraft engines,
The abruptness of rockets exploding.
This quietness was strange in my young world,
New and very frightening.

I have grown accustomed to quietness now,
And can sleep at ease in my garden;
But every night I consult the headlines
And read of children in Gaza and Syria
Besieged in war torn cities,
And I know exactly what they are feeling.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
March 18th. 2015.

For all those people who understand what it feels like to be born and nurtured in wartime..