The “raaaaaaaaag-abo” call of the rag-and-bone man still echoes round the remoter cells of my brain. I hardly ever saw him, because people in our road liked to keep their ragabos safely indoors.
Ragabo Man has gone extinct,
He’s vanished without trace.
He, and his plodding horse and cart,
Are in a Better Place.
You’d hear his plaintive call
As he trundled down our road;
But no-one ever answered it
With ragabos for his load.
Ragabo Man recycled,
Like Steptoe and his Son*,
But now the Council takes away
Our ragabos by the tonne.
* Characters in a television comedy series of the 1960s and ‘70s.