Composed while staying in a converted cattle shed which was tastefully converted. Unfortunately no one had told the spiders we had booked the place for the week!!
Where are
the snorting cattle
That browsed
in these stalls?
Where are
the yokes that
Hung from
these walls?
The
bellowing bullock,
The goat and
the cow,
The long
handled spade,
The hoe and
the plough?
Or the
honest man tilling his sun baked soil
Paying his dues
with his sweat and his toil?
Where is the
wheat and the winnowing chaff
The sun
weathered shepherd
With his
lambs and his staff?
Where are
the geese, the ducks
And the
hens,
The pigs and
the goat in their stys and their pens?
Transformed
now is all
For the
gaupes and the geeks
Over the
channel for a couple of weeks.
They’ve come
with their sunhats
Lotions and
creams
To savour
the life of their rustic dreams.
Designer
cottage, barn and gite
Transformed
by the well-healed-
To their
standard they meet.
Barn doors
and harrows
For
nostalgic effect,
Air-conditioned
sleeping and pools
They expect.
They’ll
return with their brown skin,
Their
idealised eye
Leaving the
locals to sweat 'neath the sky.
But there is
one link between
The now and
the past,
The
industrious spider who works just as fast.
He can span
the patio, window or ledge
And spread
his kingdom from the gite to the hedge.
So although
we may change
What was
there before,
The spider
can spin
Where he
spun long ago.
August 2011
