A Gentler Age

 

I was smoking my pipe outside as usual

A young observant man said that I reminded

him of a gentler age

Not many smoke pipes these days for fear 

of criticism

I acknowledged his remark and nodded

A gentler age I thought, at a time when 

young men in the trenches smoked pipes

almost to a man

Gleaned from black and white documentaries

of the Somme and Verdun

The gentler age was covered in the mud 

of battle

Where rats ate the entrails of the dead

and probably their tobacco too

Now we live in an age not so gentle

where skimmed milk, jogging and 

green vegetables will keep us alive

for ever

Perhaps my smoking habit draws attention

but not to a gentler age

For I am no sage

not an example to the present age

but a reminder of bitter warfare which

claimed millions of lives 

where a pipe and an ounce of tobacco

gave pleasure to those who knew nothing 

of leisure