Conkers

The woody musty note of fallen leaveshints that summer’s gone, but no-one grieves;at least not us schoolboys walking homeas through those piles of chestnut leaves we comb.Glossy brown gems inside their prickly huskwe search for as the day turned into dusk;when the fallen leaves had given up their stocktime to throw into the tree a stick or rock.

Conkers in autumn, sport of playground kings;horse chestnuts drilled and threaded upon strings,in turn dangled like victims from a rope;each swings his own with scarcely hidden hopeto smash their archfoe’s conker into pieces;thus the value of their own increases.

It goes like this, each day for quite a while,bruised hands and wrists accepted with a smile.One day it stops, no conkers bought to fight,time to start preparing Guys for Bonfire Night.