This is me reciting the poem below (2 minutes, 12 seconds)
Love, Peace and Ashtead
Here on the boundary, keeping score,
I mark each maiden over ‘M’.
Few of the players know this chore
nor how I sorely envy them,
nor how the concentration strays
from cricket’s laws and long delays.
Have you seen this south-west sky:
its red-cheeked clouds and puffed-up breast
that, reaching Ashtead, hears the Rye,
whose soft persuasion bids it rest?
When other pretty shires are near,
why does it pause precisely here?
Here where Surrey’s fringes skirt
at London’s bustle, hemmed with green,
the motorway takes all its hurt
away to places less serene.
Here’s where cares and woes transform
to quiet calm amid the storm.
Marking the day that Shakespeare died
who “set the teeth” that men have snarled,
St. George’s flags are hoist worldwide
and here, from Milners to The Marld.
Yet every Ashtead dweller knows:
here be no dragons. Here’s the rose.
And Ashtead’s Hall remembers Peace,
though memories of war remain.
I fear man’s fighting may not cease
till there are no fields left to gain.
O, that ‘Peace’ graced every spar
on all the village halls there are!
Beneath our feet, long worlds ago,
the Roman, off the beaten track,
trod the very clay we know,
found Ashtead Woods and looked not back.
That Roman tileman’s chiseled skill
echoes in the mind’s ear still.
Even now, nice people come
to Ashtead and decide to stay;
people like my Dad and Mum,
and gentle clouds at close of day
red carpeting the damson sky.
Again, I ask the question, why?
“Howzat?!” the leaping fielders cry -
my daydream snaps at this ado.
The umpire’s finger gives reply,
which satisfies my question too,
it points to heavens that overglide
where Ashtead, love and peace reside.
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This poem is from my lovely book. Please click it, buy it, read it, spill coffee on it and tell me you love it so much you need to buy another one. :0)
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