Chugging from the Trees of Withy

Comes the yellow diesel bus.

With a blimey, and a sithee,

Out steps Uncle Julius.

After thirty years indoors he

Stands bewildered on the causey,

Concrete monoliths astound him,

Glass and plastic all around him.

Urban beauty of my childhood, how can you be mangled thus?

Stead and Simpsons, brightly polished

Walk him into Market Square,

Past the Co-op (now demolished),

Where he bought his underwear.

Culshaw's pie-shop, there no longer,

Waberthwaite, the ironmonger,

Gone forever, like the others.

Pulls his trilby (Roberts Brothers)

Round his ears to stem the chill that whistles through his Brylcreemed hair.

Lancashire, what changing habits

Feed your monstrous appetite?

Superstores than breed like rabbits,

Bars that open day and night;

Take-aways on every corner,

Film shows (UCI and Warner),

Covered market, twenty acres,

Office blocks that have no takers,

Nothing built to please or cheer an old Victorian sybarite.

Blunt and basic, shades of Pugin,

Ancient forms with modern quirks;

Mean enough to house a Scrooge in,

Parish now of cut-price works.

Tinsel turrets, shapes unwieldy,

Coloured-banded, Butterfieldy,

Concrete tiles but chestnut-shinglish

Pyramids, but hardly English;

Take your blame oh Lamb at Bagley, Teulon at Leckhampstead (Berks)!

Gentle Ribble, once your waters,

Wandering wistfully Winckley way,

Cleaner then, like Dove's or Porter's,

Never whispered bon marché.

Town and village proudly saw you,

Kept Elysium before you;

All is lost now - a priori,

Each one tells a different story,

Sink them Ribble, in your glory, hide them under salt and spray

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