Level Crossing Nostalgia
by 
Mickey
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Posted: 04 June 2007 Word Count: 121 Summary: There’s 2 rail crossings in my home town. One was operated by a signalman turning a huge handwheel, who would wave motorists through with a smile, the other was opened by a resident gatekeeper living in a little cottage with an immaculate tiny garden. Now both are automatic, far more pedestrians/drivers can be frustrated far longer than ever dreamt of before - and with no one to blame! Brilliant isn’t it? Here’s my salute to the gatekeepers, combining happy memories of both crossings: |
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Waiting at the unmanned crossing
passage barred by metal beam
(I remembered white gate paintwork,
red disc warnings, ‘Days of Steam’)
The automatic error margin
keep the gates down overlong
(No more the handwheel man obligin’.
His numbered days have long since gone)
Impersonal and Continental
raised by no gatekeeper’s brawn
(No crossing keeper’s garden flowers
or neatly tended cottage lawn)
Just irritating lights and sirens
boasting of the coming train
(The keeper’s cottage windows boarded,
front door vandalised again)
Grasping private operators
fleecing over franchised tracks
(Oh for days of steaming steelwork,
busy branch lines, blackened ‘stacks)
Flash! - the train has passed my crossing.
Far too fast to focus eyes.
Then, sinister, the tensioned barrier
Rattles…..and begins to rise.
passage barred by metal beam
(I remembered white gate paintwork,
red disc warnings, ‘Days of Steam’)
The automatic error margin
keep the gates down overlong
(No more the handwheel man obligin’.
His numbered days have long since gone)
Impersonal and Continental
raised by no gatekeeper’s brawn
(No crossing keeper’s garden flowers
or neatly tended cottage lawn)
Just irritating lights and sirens
boasting of the coming train
(The keeper’s cottage windows boarded,
front door vandalised again)
Grasping private operators
fleecing over franchised tracks
(Oh for days of steaming steelwork,
busy branch lines, blackened ‘stacks)
Flash! - the train has passed my crossing.
Far too fast to focus eyes.
Then, sinister, the tensioned barrier
Rattles…..and begins to rise.
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