The Retired Postal Clerk

Since the wife died the house seems lonely-like,

    It isn’t quite the same place as before;

Ron’s got the garage for his motor-bike—

    I didn’t want the Morris any more.

Ron’s wife’s the trouble. When I said to her,

    ‘Why don’t you come and settle here with Ron?’

She flat refused. You’d think she would prefer

    A bigger place, with mother being gone.

But not a bit of it: and all she said

    Was, ‘What I want’s a place to call my own’—

She meant that she could wait till I was dead;

    So here I am, just living all alone.

I sold the Morris out Benhilton way—

    I couldn’t keep it in this summer weather—

That empty seat beside me all the day;

    Along the roads we used to go together

Out to Carshalton Beeches for a spin

    And back by Chislehurst and Bromley town,

Where Mum would have her lemon juice and gin

    And I would have a half of old and brown—

And those last months when she was really bad,

They were the only pleasures that she had.