My town

All in all it’s a cat-and-dog town, is my town:
Alleys for cats –
Dog-days and lamp-posts for dogs.
All in all it’s no place to be a mouse:
Cats at night, big owls too …
And hawks hanging high in the bright summer skies.

All in all it’s a good place for ever-so-smart dragonflies –
And fish that dart and swarm and shoal
In the glint of the River Wey.
All in all it’s a good place for bats –
Belfries – and chimney-stacks –
And a million sunset-insects on the wing.

It’s good, is my town, for shouting jays and rat-a-tat-tat woodpeckers
A so-so place for earnest beetles staging a last stand
In the wooden beams of the Castle.
But just think: all those slugs having a ball –
Down at the allotments –
glistening – in damp-night lettuce-leaf heaven!

It’s good for cemeteries and Rural Rides,
And brave little ferns growing on red-brick walls,
And hops – and plastic ducks – racing for charity.
All in all it’s a drawing-room alley-cat town –
– a dog called ‘Skip’, a dog called ‘Cecily’ town.
But, whatever, it’s got a good heart, has my town.

Footnote: This was my entry for the ‘My town’ poem collection.