Shelly.

You could never
forget Shelly,
with his be-bop-a-lu-la
- Gene Vincent at
six o’clock on
the manrider
train.

The flume of baccy
juice at his feet,
an act to the management,
“not too close
sunshine”,
"don’t step on my
men."

Brothers underground -
carrying Tommy Collier
out the pit twice in a
week.
A camaraderie
I grieve to have
lost.

I wish I could have
spoken to him
in those last days,
joking
in his wheelchair,
running the nurses
ragged at 63.

I could have told him:
thanks for
pointing me the
right way,
thanks for the humility
the grace and honesty
of a real man -
for your hand at
my weakest time,
for your
truth
Shelly -
for a friendship
hewn in
Anthracite.


Now
the tools
all rodded up,
your snap box empty,
water gone.
Rest now mucca,
the ratch is won.





For Mick Sheldon, my mucca.
Passed away 2005.

Note: a ratch was 10 yards of coal blasted and hand filled by one man during his shift. roughly 10 ton of coal.