How we loved them.
In an otherwise grey world
These blinkered, patient creatures
Gave us such delight as
Massive, sinewy strong, they pulled the carts
Piled high with metal parts
Over the cobbled streets
To the docks and back.
Gentle giants, with gleaming coats
Friendly, allowing us to stroke them and call their names.
These huge horses trudging along
Proud, strong workers.
Once each year-the annual fair-
They came in procession,
Bedecked in leather, silver and brass.
Garlands and roses entwined in their hair.
Like the war-horses of old
They stood stately and proud
Caparaisoned in all their finery,
Heads high, knightly in bearing,
Magnificent to behold.
One day they were gone.
The shipyards closed-
Orders gone to Japan.
They had become 'economically unviable',
An anachronism in our brave new post-war world.
But we children missed them;
They'd been our friends.
And when our eyes met theirs
We had understood each other.