A JOURNEY THROUGH AUTUMN
The autumn leaves are the colour of tramcars,
Faded yellow and faded gold.
Autumn weeps for the passing of tramcars?
Autumn weeps for a year grown old.
Then who shall weep for the passing of tramcars,
Faded scarlet and faded brown?
I who was born in this marvellous city,
But I am alive in this magical town.
And yet through a city as black as curses
I can remember them, long ago,
Shrieking and creaking like “High-Camp” verses,
Each elderly relict of Art Nouveau.
Trams Promethean, trams aspiring,
Reaching their matchstick fingers high
To strike from a tangle of stars and wiring
A spangle of sparks, like a stolen sky.
Then languorous, clangourous, moonlit tramcars
Shuttled through town like a velvet loom,
Pale and snailing tramcars trailing
A silver thread through romantic Hulme.
Then passing a park, all iron-girt
With laurel-like railings, as though scared of seeing -
What? Well, I passed “E. Lit.” in the old School Cert:
Try “Ghosts before an enchanter fleeing”.
Fleeing down central reservations,
Trams with the future upon their brow
Roll to that ultimate destination,
Semi-detached from the here-and-now.
Now, private people with privet hedges
Disembark from funereal cars,
Stages away from the universe edges,
THAT suburb, remote as the autumn stars.
But the trams continue, through ground-mist wading,
More than a hint of the coming frost;
Autumn now into winter fading,
More than just railway bridges crossed.
Electrical spectres, their season dying,
Fettered with age and the weight of years,
To Barlow Moor Road the trams come sighing,
It’s the final stage. All cars stop here.
The autumn leaves are the colour of tramcars,
Scarlet and yellow they fade and drop;
And drift down the street, like frost-touched tramcars -
Where are they going? The final stop.
We’ll of us one day hobble
Groaning like ghosts, to Southern Cemetery,
Rattling OUR chains along the cobbles.
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