Thank God, or St Giles anyway,

For Stoney Clouds.

You could be anywhere in the: Peaks, the counties, the Dales or the moors.

 

Jays give sudden alarm in coppice charms,

As people arrive, who should be indoors,

Locked down from our friends and family,

But luckily not the green of Stoney.

 

Stoney, an apt name for stoner youth,

Pot-plastered at the bench,

On the summit of cardboard hill.

 

Magpies and crows stand guard,

Atop half-naked trees.

Dog-walkers are driven by canine needs,

Pulling their owners off into the weeds.

 

A mist transpires, this October magic gloom,

Giving mystique to pickers of mushrooms,

In the cow fields below.

Are they just wanting to get as high as Stoney,

or do they have shamanic inspirations?

 

Owls screech in ancient timbers,

at stolen elderflowers back in May,

which I transformed into alchemical bubbles

and exile champagnes,

now all sadly drank.

 

A fox scatters through the churchyard,

Amongst the headstones.

Squirrels race for the cover of the pines,

As Buzzards call into the twilight sky.

 

Thank God, or St Giles anyway,

For Stoney Clouds.