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I am a small brown bird
difficult to see among the branches
but on occasion I can astonish you
with my tuneful complicated song.
Michael Lane
Once I was a schoolboy studying geography -
Where places are, the rivers and the hills,
What cows they keep in Hereford and Worcestershire -
Old-fashioned facts that a grammar school instils.
So when I rode off, exploring on my bicycle,
Staying at youth hostels (a shilling for a bed)
Gratified to find the Chilterns marching north-east,
Then the Vale of Oxford, just as the books had said.
Yet still I puzzled, how did people make a living?
Cycling through Berkshire, my diary condemns
Tea-less Wallingford, shut up on a Sunday
(Ancient Saxon crossing on the middle Thames).
What did people do here, in their red brick boxes?
Perhaps there was a market - there was a Market Square.
Was it enough to keep the money flowing?
And why live in this town, and not elsewhere?
All these years later, the same questions baffle me:
No more coal mines, fewer fields grow food -
Everyone in offices, sending endless e-mails -
How can they pay me to sit at home and brood?
Michael Lane
No letters for me in the post.
I really ought to sweep the path.
The dust gets thicker on that shelf.
Is this the day I have my bath?
No point in getting up too soon.
Perhaps I'll wash a pair of socks.
There's still one egg left in the fridge.
Tomorrow I must wind both clocks.
I'll need a nap this afternoon.
My glasses must have gone astray.
I think I'll make a pot of tea.
Will this loaf last another day?
Michael Lane
2/06