VE Day 80
By Greta Ward
We gathered around the wireless, Mum and Dad, brothers, sisters and me.
We knew it was something important. Winston Churchill was speaking, you see.
His words came out loud to the nation. We sat there and listened in awe.
He said that Hitler was beaten. Great Britain had won the war.
Well, Mum sat there crying and laughing. I saw my Dad’s cheeks looking wet
But of course, in those days men didn’t cry, So he lit up a cigarette.
The year was 1945, On that beautiful day in May.
My parents sat, shocked into silence. They didn’t know what to say.
I knew that the war was over For that was what we’d been told,
But I didn’t quite understand it all – I was only eight years old.
Dad said, ‘You can sleep in your bed again, Instead of the cold and damp,
Of that shelter in the garden, Lit by a hurricane lamp.’
I went out the front, to swing on our gate, As I’d been forbidden to do,
And saw all the kids, just as I was, Dressed up in red, white and blue.
Would we no longer run to the shelters At the air raid siren’s call,
As we cowered down in terror To wait for the bombs to fall?
Would we never again see our fighter planes, So many, they blackened the sky,
With pilots so young they were only lads, Many destined to die?
As I swung, I wondered what life would be, Now that we’d won the war.
After all, this life was all I had known. I didn’t remember before.
I called across to my little friend. Her dad was in France to fight.
Her mummy was told he was ‘missing or dead’. She prayed for him every night.
Would we, shaking with fear in the shelter, Wait for its engine to stop?
For we knew when its motor was silent, The Doodlebug killer would drop.
Perhaps there’d be no more searchlights That lit up the sky at night,
To search for the enemy aircraft And shoot them down, on sight.
Perhaps we would buy real Mars Bars And food rationing would stop,
Instead of the cardboard cutouts On the shelf at our corner shop?
The neighbours came out of their houses, To laugh and to cry and to sing,
To hang up the flags and the banners, And to hear the church bells ring.
Dad said our lives would be changing, Now that Great Britain was free,
But I was only delighted Mum was Making Spam fritters for tea.