A day like any other –
In the middle of a war.
Except it isn’t.
Anticipation is high as
Mabel and Gertie Bowbrick,
And devoted mother, Nellie,
Wait patiently in line
Outside Stokes greengrocers
On teeming Tontine Street,
For a special delivery
Of scarce fruit and vegetables
Later that afternoon.
At twenty minutes past six,
With darkening clouds
Concealing surprise,
What sounds like gunfire
Is heard from the direction of
Shorncliffe Army Camp.
“It’s just training manoeuvres,
It happens all the time”,
The general consensus
Among an unconcerned crowd,
Comforted that Blighty
Remains up for the fight.
Until two minutes later
When the lengthening queue
Is obliterated by single bomb,
Casually hurled from
A passing Gotha plane.
Frederick and Arthur Stokes,
And their family
Perish on the spot,
Along with Mabel and Gertie
And many of their neighbours.
Sixty one slain in total,
The youngest three months old,
Thirty six more lives snuffed out
Before the final toll is known
Nearly eight years later,
When valiant, much loved Nellie
Draws her last breath in the
Royal Victoria Hospital,
Half a mile from the scene.
No rationing of potatoes as planned,
But rather a rationing of civilian lives,
Lost in a line of innocence and hope.
Today, flanked by brewery tap
And greasy spoon,
A small, pale blue plaque,
Sometimes adorned
With a spray of flowers,
Stands by a bare, open patch,
Where tenacious weeds
Thrust through shards of slate.
Tony Quarrington 