It's very _rural_, Roger. It always fascinates me how this country, the most
and longest urbanised in the world, with the possible exceptions of Belgium
or Holland, continues to produce a poetry of villages and fields. I feel the
drag myself, whenever I go walking in the countryside lanes and fields I
start getting a compulsion to go into village churches (as well as the
pubs!)

As if the countryside were a religious substitute. Or Mother.

I very much like the image of the tree settling its roots in the final
stanza, not sure about the dialect transcription, sounds a bit Thos
Hardyesque, but it's always hard to put non-Standard English into written
form.

Best

Dave


----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger Collett" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, September 03, 2001 6:39 PM
Subject: Poem of mine


> Am looking for comment and crit on the following as I don't have a group
to
> work with at the moment.
>
>
> The 'Ipsy 'Awsy Tree
>
>
> Midsummer's eve.
> The village nestles under the downs
> beneath the stick figure of the white horse.
>
> On the hill above
> there's a rattling of twiggy branches
> as the tree lifts its roots from the chalky soil
> and strides off across the down.
>
> In the 'Baker's Arms',
> a fat, rather grubby old man
> sits in the corner of the public bar
> relating local legend
> to the team from the BBC.
>
> Old Tich puts down his empty glass.
> "Used to be giants hereabout,
> they'm all gone now, et by the dragon.
> Still see their footprints alongside the Manger,
> the valley by the 'orse.
> Only baint an 'orse really,
> tis the ghost of the dragon.
>
> Old George killed the dragon
> on top of Dragon's Hill.
> There's a patch on top
> where the blood ran out.
> Tis bare to this day
> and nuthin ever grows there.
> All the fairy folk are gone now
> and all the bad wights 'cept one".
> He looks at his glass and waits.
>
> The interviewer fetches another pint.
> "Which one's that then, Tich?"
> "The one he's been scaring the kids with again"
> comes a voice from the bar.
>
> "You mark what I sez,
> the 'Ipsy 'Awsy tree walks the Vale
> each Midsummer's eve.
> It'll have the blood of a child,
> the wrong 'un what's out after midnight,
> whose folk don't care for 'un proper.
> Mark my words, someone'll regret tonight".
>
> He downs his pint,
> leaves the bar to the murmur of angry voices
> and goes back to lock himself in his cottage.
> The BBC team pack up their gear and leave
> as the landlord cries "Time gentlemen please".
>
> Just before dawn, on the hillside,
> not quite in the same place as before,
> the tree settles its roots into the thin earth,
> its berries bright with the colour of blood.
>
> Roger Collett
> 2nd September 2001
>