Bubblegum

FINER FRIDAY

http://finerfriday.blogspot.com/

chose the topic

BUBBLEGUM

I've never chewed on bubblegum;

I've never had the pleasure

Of blowing a big sticky ball

Almost too large to measure.

I've never tasted the colour pink,

Or learned the art of blowing;

I've never seen the bubble grow

Filled with air to overflowing.

I've never felt the bubble burst

All flatly on my face.

I've never peeled the remnants off,

Every elongated trace.

*

But I have worn a gas-mask;

That was my childhood thrill,

And I remember it clearly; I think I always will.

Childhood is a joyful time

Whatever the circumstance

And my childhood was a wartime one,

By pure historical chance.

And I remember the air-raid shelters,

Where children sat in rows,

Each child with a gas-mask

Covering it's nose.

We made such glorious noises,

Lavatory noises really,

Blowing bubbles at each other.

I still hear us clearly!

Now young people blow their bubbles

Of a peaceful sort of pink;

In my childhood I did the same.

I'm glad there is a link.

*

-------------------------------------------------------

THE PINK ROSE

Oh! How pinkly pretty!

How miraculously pure!

Not a blemish! Not a freckle!

A work of art for sure.

Was she really that uncrumpled?

That uncreased? That fresh and bright?

Was the day a little cloudy

Yet she was bathed in light?

The young girls of that era

Must have gazed at this in awe

Thinking her the ultimate;

The best they ever saw!

And did they suffer heartache

Because their skins were beige

With here and there the evidence

Of swiftly-advancing age?

Today we talk of models

Who're almost skin and bone,

And we worry that our young girls

May compare and weep alone.

But surely in the old days

Comparisons were made

And 'teenagers' were haunted

By that dire phrase 'an old maid'!

This pinkly perfect poppet

Has been air-brushed, in a way.

The artist's brush transformed her

And that is how she'll stay.

She's the pinnacle of perfection

Of another earlier age,

Designed to send her sisters

into a jealous rage!

*