THOUGHTS ON A VANISHING LANDSCAPE
by Kate & Chris Eastwood
Rolling home in the dark on a winter's evening.
Deer bounding out of the fields in the blaze of our headlights
on the Elsenham to Broxted road.
A young stag turns in mid-flight.
He hesitates and watches for his family to cross safely.
God speed.
Staring owls, standing on verges,
crying at night in the trees around our home.
Ducks on Doctor's Pond and migrant geese.
Pheasants and moorhens weave across paths.
Bats on our cottage wall in broad daylight.
Badgers foraging in the garden after dark.
Windmills and white weatherboard cottages.
Black Essex barns. Elegant mansions. Thatched houses.
Rolling golden hills of oil seed rape,
scarred green by tractor wheels.
Narrow winding tracks and signposted crossroads.
Saffron Walden on a Saturday afternoon in summer.
Families picnicking on vast green swards.
Jazz band playing in the market square.
Community stalls and produce stalls.
Antique shops with musty books and Toby Jugs
and elegantly clad wedding guests picking through bric-a-brac.
The sun shines down on everyone and the church bells ring.
A cricket game at Rickling Green.
White cricketers run on tended grass.
While we sip beer in the sunshine.
At Thaxted Morris men dance on the Guildhall pavement.
While visitors marvel and the planes rumble overhead.
Massive combine harvesters work the land.
Crop dust drifting.
Tractors trundle lanes to gated fields.
Riders take their morning turn.
Commuters waiting.
Driving dark frosty lanes to
The Five Parishes Christmas church services.
Ancient draughty churches decorated for Christmas,
bathed in candlelight, full to bursting.
A young policewoman in full uniform
conducting an orchestra of handbells.
Singing in the choir, blinded by tears
when the vicar's simple sermon spoke of this old church,
which had stood for centuries on this Essex hill.
North West Essex. Our North West Essex.
Where history and modern life coexist.
A place to work and to live.
For families and for refugees
from London's savage sprawl.
A once small airfield.
A friendly neighbour turned hostile.
All to change, all for money.
And what shall we tell our children?
