“On Fridays, we eat fish,”
She told me as we’d walked up, chatting, from the Waterside.
The train track, routed by the river bend,
Arched underneath the city’s second bridge.
A towering form (or so we thought so then);
Two mighty levels for the traffic that roared by.
Mindful of warnings, kept alert by news,
We exited the station: took the lower level of the bridge.

To navigate the upper storey, then,
Was foolhardy and just not worth the risk.
We knew the news reports – civilians shot;
A soldier ambushed on his way back from patrol.
We walked the rattling, fume-soaked lower deck
Then up the hill and down into the Bog*.

Newly friends, we’d learned each other’s rituals;
But lecture halls and theatres were neutral and benign.
Walking on home turf was different when the soil was new;
Signs and signals were foreign – caught us unawares –
But we were young enough to want to learn.

We’d walked the rough-edged pavement to the house
When suddenly she stopped – and all too casually inquired –
‘My mother was worried you might be insulted…I mean…
(She struggled here) She thought you might prefer
If she took down the Sacred Heart while you were here?

I could not answer for the grief that swamped me then;
I had no right to ask it – and made clear to tell her so.
Her friendship and her family were what had drawn me in;
The rules of her house would be mine while I was there.
And so it was I found my second home –
A tiny terrace in a torn city with a generous, beating heart.

I’ve visited often in the years since then,
And on Fridays, we eat fish.

© Anne McMaster 2016

*The Bogside.