I've never understood the england you paint for me -
everything corrupt and black - and everywhere else
is better - though somehow you are never included
in this hell of venal sinners - seemingly because -
- well - you're an internationalist - or some other ist -
and being an ist exempts reason and decency and ist truth -
bluebells I am told are a sign of ancient woodland -
not unlike the those ovals of white tiny stars one sees
on a pavement under rose bushes - a symbol of a petal
- decayed - and so beautiful that it must leave a mark -
last night it rained - and turned the paths to black mud -
as I slithered in the wood of scentless withering bluebells
cracks like cannon carried to my ear - and shouts of
'catch it' and clapping - 'come on boys' and 'keep going' -
or perhaps the photos that I looked at in the library -
of the circus coming to town - horses washed in the river -
and a straight backed man sitting on a chair
in high collar - frock coated - in a cage with a lion -
white washed cottages of tumble down build
bearing trade signs - for - mule carriages to lease or hire -
as we looked and tried to tell - from the bend in the river -
the perspective from which it was taken -
I get home to find the ists gobbing off again -
their phlegmatic target the statue to women
whose only crime was to be alive when the ists made war -
those women perhaps enjoyed days like mine -
chatting with friends and looking at the past
to relate to their present - or wandering in woods
to catch the dying of spring - wishing for the summer -
and those petals of ghostly joys -
'fuck tory scum' -
I don't understand the england you paint for me
The Blue Book
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