October 25, 2010

The valley burn flows beside the old defunct line

Placed together betwixt hawthorn and gorse

Sharing the route on a parallel course

The brook veers from the abandoned way

The gushing stream has another role to play

Sustaining nature and her creatures

Becoming one of Spennymoor’s many features

The town has changed despite indifferent times

First, the iron works, then grim coalmines

From dark-stoned terraced houses to council estate

Through agonising eras, people created a trait.

The flowing water continues through

A town presenting the old and new

Sometimes slow, occasionally in flood

Into Cow Plantation, then Spring Wood

The River Wear envelops it through to the sea

An inspirational example with its long history

Patiently preserving and accepting fate

One can start small then become great.

Thomas Conlon, Spennymoor

My friend

I have a friend

I have known her for years

She’s thoughtful and generous

To me, she’s very dear.

She has a large garden

With some apple trees

And every year, in the autumn

She shares her apples with me.

She brings me three bagsful

Then I get busy

Boiling the apples and baking

Are we having apple pie and custard

Tonight, or stewed apple and cream?

(Dedicate to my good friend Maureen)

Emma Thomas, Darlington

The international brigade

Salute the men and women too,

Who fought on Spanish soil,

And paid a heavy price in blood,

the fascist’s plot to foil.

Because their eyes were open wide,

Could see no other way,

While others did not want to see,

And turned their eyes away.

And yet their message rings out still,

Their banner, though it be torn,

Yet flying, streams like thunder storm,

Against the evil wind.

One in four did not return,

They went of their free will,

And yet we never can repay,

The debt we owe them still.

A Holmes, Ferryhill

Reminder

I hate the coat that you left,

It won’t let me forget,

It keeps alive the regret,

Of the moments spent thinking of you.

Alison Carr, Bishop Auckland