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Miss J. Hunter Dunn, Miss J. Hunter Dunn,Furnish'd and burnish'd by Aldershot sun,What strenuous singles we played after tea,We in the tournament - you against me!
John Betjeman -
In the licorice fields at PontefractMy love and I did meetAnd many a burdened licorice bushWas blooming round our feet;Red hair she had and golden skin,Her sulky lips were shaped for sin,Her sturdy legs were flannel-slack'dThe strongest legs in Pontefract.
John Betjeman
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Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough!It isn't fit for humans now,There isn't grass to graze a cow.Swarm over, Death!
John Betjeman -
And behind their frail partitionsBusiness women lie and soak,Seeing through the draughty skylightFlying clouds and railway smoke.Rest you there, poor unbelov'd ones,Lap your loneliness in heat,All too soon the tiny breakfast,Trolley-bus and windy street!
John Betjeman -
Safe were those evenings of the pre-war worldWhen firelight shone on green linoleum,I heard the church bells hollowing out the sky,Deep beyond deep, like never-ending stars.
John Betjeman -
But I'm dying now and done for,What on earth was all the fun for?I am ill and old and terrified and tight.
John Betjeman -
Stony seaboard, far and foreign,Stony hills poured over space,Stony outcrop of the Burren,Stones in every fertile place.
John Betjeman -
The test of an abstract picture, for me, is not my first reaction to it, but how long I can stand it hanging on the wall of a room where I am living.
John Betjeman