Drank in the sixties with my mum,
In a South London public bar.
Dominoes click on the table,
We’re going to play batchy fives.
Lonnie shuffles, Ghostie buys drinks,
A pint of prawns, some pickled eggs,
And four bags of Smith’s crisps, with salt.
Pegs leapfrog round the cribbage board,
The food and beers are bang on song,
I marvel at end game tactics,
Ghostie and Lonnie are old boys,
Their glee as they win plain to see,
That was the point it dawned on me,
They’d been Victorian children.

Harry Rogers, in the Yellow Room, 17th February 2021.