August 2005 Malaysia
‘Ta-raa, love.’ Those were the last words that you said to me
on that cold, grey, wet Bridgend morning, those years ago.
They seem to me like an infinite eternity,
but somehow, the emotions continue to flow.
I read the local papers, to check out the casualty.
But I saw nothing. I didn’t imagine that you’d have an affair,
even though you spent late nights out, with regularity.
I didn’t think to ask with whom, or why, or where.
It was some weeks later when the Police came here
and asked if I knew where your passport was kept.
It hadn’t occurred to me you might disappear.
But, as many remark, I’m useless, a bit weak and inept.
The children found it hard to come to grips
with the fact that you weren’t going to return.
But Bronwyn and Geraint help me cook the fish and chips.
It’s sad, though, when I see their little eyes yearn.
Your parents weren’t really much of an assistance.
They fobbed off my questions, pretending not to know.
I found it hard to understand the resistance
to let a husband know where a wife would go.
But life goes on, much as the way it did before.
Weekends, I pop out with the boys to the pub.
The children wait up to make sure I lock the door.
I miss your kisses, and giving my back a rub.
Your parents went off some months later, New Zealand or Australia.
No-one really seemed to know where, Brisbane, maybe Sydney.
I know most people, including you, consider me a total failure,
but I’d like to know why you did this to the children and me.
The garden’s nice, patio’s finished, in summer the birds come and sing.
But with me laid off (sick), we don’t have too much money now.
I keep on hoping that one day you’ll give us a ring.
A few hundred quid would help, but we get by somehow.
I can’t forget our courtship. I said ‘I’m Richard, aka Dickie the Duck, quack, quack.’
You laughed, and said you were Gail, and that I was daft. Yes, I suppose now that’s true.
I said (coz you on the big size) ‘Your Gail the Whale, and you hit the sea, whack, whack.’
The people in the pub thought we were a bit peculiar, me and you.
I can’t think of anything else to tell you,
I think of the time I last saw you walk out of the door.
You smiled, and told me to take care of our two.
I can’t understand why you don’t want to see us no more.
This is Dickie the Duck signing off. I love you. Quack, quack.
Postscript Three years on.
I’m alone now, with both of them gone now for quite a while.
Bron’s husband ran off; she’s in her fifteenth week of pregnancy.
Geraint’s works with his partner, Rhodri, in a men’s wear shop in Pyle.
It’s lonely now, just the tablets and clock for company.
But one thing I taught myself to do real well, and that’s cook.
Of course, I get a lot of practice, being on my own.
but I wish you were here (postcard!) and take a culinatery look.
Peas and carrots with butter, cheese on toast, packet curry chicken, off the bone.
Apart from my check up, I only get out weekends, shopping’s cheaper of course.
Half price pizza, lettuce, celery reduced. I got 50p off a packet of pilau.
A couple of quid to spare, a pack of beer. Last week got a bottle of Tabasco sauce.
Expiry date, got it free! It’s hot, but the fish and chips taste better now.
Nothing else, I think. I won’t be writing again.
Last time I saw you, you said ‘Take care,’ and then you slipped your raincoat on.
Pity you didn’t come back, but I hope your proud of me for seeing to our two.
Perhaps things, how can I put it, would have worked out different like, if you hadn’t gone.
The fish and chips taste better now, but not as good as when with you.
Ta-raa, love.
(Wherever you are)
