Through Swineshead and Sutterton
and Gedney
I drove us down the old river-bed road
That was a part of leaving Norfolk: the theory
Of desolation from the road-edge—how the wind
Stripped their senses into dullness, or a test
Of who made who, land or man, and found
Some harsh male pact that drove the sea out,
But fades—a spiritual will-o’-the-wisp
And the misty kids gone crazy with incest
Or sucking poppy seeds: their mothers picking
Stones and weeds, cheeks red-veined early;
All indistinct now from hearsay or reading—
A view of communities on the outside only
That overlooked the canning factory and new
Houses sustained by love and money:
And for me a string of places I went through
To get elsewhere, but still surprised
By this wasteland and all the crops it grew.
|
Supported
by Norfolk Tourism