Poems of Place: At Southridge, Horspath
Another day of staring blankly in this room?
Even my glass of rosé fails to lift the evening gloom
There’s been too little bandwidth and just too much Zoom,
I think I’ve got the lonesome lockdown blues…
Are you getting bored with all those virus metrics?
And there’s nothing left to watch on Amazon Prime or Netflix
My ennui extends to even You Tube’s pet tricks
I’ve just got the lonesome lockdown blues…
My iPod has just finished its final rotation
The playlist had too many songs of un-splendid isolation
But it’s time to lift the spirit of the Nation
Gotta get out…
Gotta get out…
Gotta get out of the lonesome lockdown blues!
NB Some chords could be used for the full lockdown experience:
Am Dm7 E7 G
Am Dm7 E7 G
Am G Dm7 E
Am E Dm7 Am
April 2020
Flotsam and Jetsam 
in new inn hall st 1979
“Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.”
but the angel anointed of the cross keys shook his grey fringed head
too much expression-the noises left
heard from his rooms he disapproved
we were not his virgins
Adam’s Ale or Wadworth’s or any blushful grape
the Lord of the Isles come to bid for a bride
who spurns him dancing with the band
Which has missed the point?
And the isle of the stallion
the crooked overflowing river
are heartsease ever-renewing
that river flows here still : its own sweet will- ABermo
and in those once crowded streets
inheritors of dark satanic mills
the palaces of money and the law
suck pale necks just as greedily
the tired aesthete meanwhile
trashes his toys
in counterpoint finds distony
pasyet? akarma? karmani!
OK ageing was not nice – we are all ageing – it was the metre that tempted me and the alliteration -replace with stifled?
So who is Claire Gilham?
What a serve! Google Me! I’ve always wanted to say that…
Well I’m a pot hall person like you – the oldest in the first year of the monstrous regiment. A Barmouth sunset is shaping up outside the window with wind whistling and sand shimmying. and for the rest well as I said …
Pot hall? Monstrous regiment? More clues please Claire!
I was actually at Brasenose, Claire – in a house opposite St Peters which admitted women (at least officially) in 1979 and I believe there was an inaugural StPBC women’s 8 with one C Gilham at number 3 Very nice to correspond, Madam
New Inn Hall Street Michaelmas 1979 the crossed keys of St.Peter le Bailey, and the chaplain whose set adjoined mine asked the first woman to give the Annunciation in that bare-bones Anglican chapel, with the result as I wrote last night.
That generation called St Peter’s Pot Hall, but have I assumed too far did you live behind the brass door-knocker three streets away?
crossed wires and crossed comms. a pleasure to correspond with you too Paul. I had seen your book – and Farchynys was the first place we stayed in Barmouth. I hope you still get over here – the surf rumbles its agreement in the background
Send me a proper email (mine is paul.walton@orange.fr)and I’ll send you a link to some sad old Oxford love songs we got around to recording recently – and next time I’m Mawddach bound (whenever that will be – March hopefully) I’d love to say hello, Claire – much to talk about! Paul ps can I post your poem now?
yes that’s done looking forward…