I have a proposal. I will publish on this blog poems in the category ‘Poems About Abingdon‘. They could be written by you or are poems we can get the rights to publish. Then in October I will ask one of our established poets to select ten, with no more than two by the same author, and publish them in time for Christmas in a book of poems and pictures called ‘Ten Poems About Abingdon‘. All rights will remain with the author. It is not a money spinner. The book price will cover costs.

Here to start you off is a verse I have been trying to write (suggestions for improvements very welcome) …

Walking the 1556 Abingdon Bounds – draft

A couple of dogs, and eighty people
meet together on New Years’ Day.
The Town Crier swings and rings his bell,
and cries with joy ‘Hear ye!’ ‘Hear ye!’

The leader welcomes ‘one and all’
to walk the ancient Borough Bounds
where Mayor and Council once paraded
to better know their charter lands.

Refashioned as a two hour walk
to help us thin our growing waists
filled with turkey, bowls of nuts,
selection boxes, After Eights.

Not long until we are back at work –
down East St Helen Street we walk.
Some of us saunter in the road
and regroup at St Helen’s Wharf.

The leader reads the Tudor route
and then a modern commentary
“… from the aforesaid Helen’s Bridge …
to the new made promontory …’

Chasing idlers to the Park
The Town Crier rings and hails The Queen!
Albert’s statue placed aloft –
taken young – what might have been?

We come across a boundary stone
warn smooth and without date or number.
A Happy New Year! cry resounds
And wakes the revelers from their slumber

The town has broken all its bounds
with modern houses, gardens, walls.
The boundary stones are overgrown,
The River Thames floods and sprawls.

By the weir we cross the River
and note a boundary stone marked ‘A’ –
used as a latch near the lock.
What a shame! The people say.