Spark Hall Junior School

He sat in his car as they demolishedA part of his youth.The men with the wrecking balls, David thought,Were like the bloody knights on their destriersCarving the life out of the French on theBattlefields of a contested France.But he knew there was no hot blood flowingIn the veins of the workers tearing downThe walls of a building and his memories.They did not see children playingFishes in the Net, or rememberThe warmth of the top playground as he satIn the sun and talked with Keith and Kenneth about‘Journey Into Space’ with Jet Morgan.There was for them no winter scene whereKids made slides in that playgroundAnd hurtled down, careless of fear or fractureTowards the rusty steel railings -The workers tore away the buttressesThat kids ran up like monkeys oblivious toThe rules of the school or the laws of gravity.

There are neat houses now where the oldVictorian building stood and as the yearsBurn away, so more and more memories decay.Very few can stare at this scene and seeA pudgy Irene Haigh singing with her friend,Charming a classroom full of kids with a song:I see them still, mill workers’ children goingTo meet the Vanderbilts for tea –A Couple of Swells unable to ride or sailUp the avenue –So they walked as we all once walked.But Irene has taken her last walk,Cancer, not her friend, took her downAn avenue towards a dead end.

And even after so many busy burning yearsSome of us still remember a classroomFull of kids and intense silence –Miss Burton reading an alphabetical list:A list which led to Harrods or Woolworths -A brave new world or a scrap yard.And so many had to deal with, ever after,The few simple words: I have failed -Buildings, like people, delight and dismay.