Fraserburgh, A True Story: September Weekend 1971. Poem by PAUL COLVIN

Fraserburgh, A True Story: September Weekend 1971.



We finally made it, a boys’ weekend away
Me and big Rikki we’re up here to play,
In a caravan perched high up on a hill
And our company doubled with Bib and wee Gill.
On the first night we welcomed them back
But at quarter to three they had to make tracks
We walked on the path ‘til we came to a field
And that’s when our hearts decided to yield.
Rikki had asked, “what’s that over there”?
Although it was late, the sky was so clear,
The light just played tricks, I couldn’t see well
But a split second later, we thought, “we’re in Hell”!
We stood there in terror, rigid as posts
For standing beside us were a young couples’ ghosts,
I grabbed onto Rikki and he onto me
Petrified, frozen, with trembling knees!
Our tongues couldn’t speak so we spoke with our eyes
Our wee hearts were pumping from the thought of demise,
I was seventeen and Rikki was younger
And the emptiness felt was not down to hunger
But just when we thought that we were condemned
Bib said “it’s okay, I can talk to them”!
I remember it clearly, like it happened today
And whatever she said, it sent them away.
Then she told us the story, of love and of life
How this young couple engaged, soon to be man and wife
Took a stroll on this pitch as they did every day
And how the horrors of war, took their young lives away.
The Luftwaffe’s bombers flew over the sea,
Their mission? Destruction, to gain victory
But a young couple walking, so much in love
Were killed on that day by a bomb from above.
Thirty years on, their legend remains
Eternally walking within their restraints,
The perimeter lines of this old football pitch
Keeps them enclosed and the lives once so rich
Are now locked in this limbo awaiting God’s will
To free two young people from this penitent state
But still they are trapped ‘til they learn their fate.

Almost forty years on, I still think of that night
And when I see Rikki we speak of those sights;
Ghosts, yes we’ve seen them, and that terror and fear
Half scared us to death and stayed with us for years
But time’s a great healer and those fears have now passed
And I hope that our lovers have found their peace at last.

So fondly remembered in our hearts and minds.

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