Remembered Hallowe’ens Of Childhood Poem by C Richard Miles

I dream of Hallowe’en when we were children:
No transatlantic pumpkin at our sides
But turnip dug by dad from frost-washed garden
And carved with care with chore-dulled kitchen knife
Till gaping, gap-toothed grin emerged. Then, skewered
By knitting needle, safe-secured by string,
With stub of candle craftily inserted
In hot-wax solder, to secure its grip.

Thin pins affixed the lid, cut raw and artless,
As pale-pink, trembling hands held high aloft
The leering lantern, bright amidst the darkness,
With stench of charring turnip on the drift
Of autumn air, to chime with leaf-fall bonfire.
Ghost-children, clad with tattered, white-sheet rags
Would prowl around, performing knock-down-ginger
On primed relations, armed with paper bags.

Their generous gifts were treacle-fudge or toffee,
Home-made in time-worn, copper-bottomed pan,
Poured out to set in buttered, tinplate cake-tray
Cut carefully in squares by skilful hands.
Accepted gratefully, these simple sweeties
Would blacken teeth but. in those long-lost days,
No notion had we then of healthy eating,
Just after rationing had met its fate.

Those days held no commercial trick-or-treating:
Homely apple-bobbing was our fun,
With fallen fruit from orchard for our eating
Or set in rock-hard toffee by our mum.
We children rampaged round the sleepy village
With ghostly howls and whoops upon our lips,
Like hordes of Vikings out to spoil and pillage
But still more innocent than today’s kids.