Greacen008

One Day Last August

One day last August, travelling by bus to Annslong,
Past fields brown-pimpled with haycocks,
And whitewashed rectangular houses,
I tried - expatriate now - to overhear
The homely rhythms that these people use
As running murmur to a simple way of life
Through their world's wilderness of tangled hate
I tried to see the obverse of the coins
That tinkle brash in every little till
And echo that intolerance I knew too well.
Then came the answer on that August day:
If you would find the virtue of this place
Then search it out in tidy village streets
And in the narrow, stone-walled fields,
For there these people build in quietness,
Far from the politicians vulgar rant
That tears the fabric of this land.