River Poems


The old girl at the heart of the city.


Today's muse is not so much dragon flies
-although one has danced for us
But the unsteady clobber of toddlers on decking
The hum of jazz
and the multicoloured sparkles of humanity seeking
beauty, space and sky

Here in the sprawl
are regimented trees
guarding the way
To the old girl at the heart of the city

Even the anarchists have a voice
here, in the wild clumps
of tight fisted umbellifera
the dive bombing pigeons
and restlessness of kids.

Marie-Antoinette might have felt at home here
among the lavender waves
the green promenades
the box hedges and reflective hulls
of the Thames barrier

Here past, present and future meet
in the race for the golden olympiad
and we rekindle our love
with secret passwords
mystical journeys
and
the joy of guerilla poetry


Lucyann Ashdown 3/9/10


London and Me


If it had always been straight lines
I would have died
If it was always predictable and solutions and the right way of doing things and lines always the same length
I would have died.

They tried to make it that way
But the river never flowed that way
It bent
and twisted
like a man's mind

And we drew our life from it
London oozed from it                         and grew
sucking in to it a world's empire.

If all the streets were straight
and all the avenues wide
I would have died
But I found a place to twist and ooze and draw my life from it.

James Ashdown 3/9/10