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Poems tagged ‘England’

Time To All Believe ~ Day 21 SF Euro 2020 haiku

Crispin Thomas

Thursday, July 8th, 2021

one more step to take

can this really be our time?

time to all believe

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We Ain’t…

kevin raymond

Sunday, July 4th, 2021

Searching for Elysian Fields, Utopia
Nirvana, The Golden Fleece, Tir na nOg?
The next Bernard Briggs, Roy o’ The Rovers,
Or the fortuitous ill-named Hand a God?

Nah. Desiring dreams ain’t reality, true to life-like?
Doesn’t inspire us, to singing loudly in the streets?
What we want is?  The sight o’ Raheem Sterling on his bike,
Flying down the wing. Oh, and perhaps…two more clean sheets!

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We’ve Won in Rome. We’ve Won in Rome…

kevin raymond

Sunday, July 4th, 2021

In there, fighting still
Beating Ukraine four goals to nil
On a balmy night in The Eternal City…Rome.

Time to shower, board a plane
Fly back to Blighty, face The Danes
On Wednesday night in our Eternal Home.

Say…we dispatch the marauding Danes?
Are we a match for Italia or Spain?
On current form? I’d say the answers…yes.

Tis looking like this could be our year?
Let’s raise the roof, scream aloud n cheer,
Support the chaps…in their quest for success.

On the subject of success, though I digress,
Please raise a glass, come Monday next,
To 73 years, of our absolutely blinding…NHS.

We’ve won in Rome
We’ve won in Rome
We won four-nil, last night in Rome!
The road goes ever on, t’wards our Eternal Home.

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It’s Coming Home

Stuart Butler

Sunday, July 4th, 2021

When the working class was first given the vote,
The Home Secretary said:
‘We must educate our masters’;

The result was the Education Act,
Which resulted in elementary schools,
Throughout the cities, towns, villages and hamlets
Of the United Kingdom;

Single storey, red brick or local stone,
Separate entrances for boys and girls,
Sometimes seemingly more Arts & Crafts
Just as at Bagpath, near Stroud,

Where the headteacher walked the lanes,
Ringing the bell through the winding
Spring-line hamlet;
Children trudging or running to school,
Along the lanes, footpaths and holloways,
To study the pink bits on the world map on the wall,
To learn the 3Rs and the catechism,
To receive a ruler rap across the knuckles,
To go absent at harvest time,
To cry when their fathers were killed in war,
To sing their hymns of praise,
To raise the flag and march on Empire Day.

But we danced to a different tune,
Watching the match against Ukraine
Projected on the wall where the imperial map
Once dominated the class attention;
We danced because it’s coming home
To a new rainbow post-imperial England,
Diverse in form, formation and composition;

But the ghost children rose from their cramped desks,
To join us in our collective hymn of praise and joy:
‘It’s coming home, it’s coming home,
It’s coming,
Football’s coming home.’

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Come On England ~ Revisited

Stuart Butler

Thursday, July 1st, 2021

It’s possible to shout that in umpteen different languages
And still mean it.
‘Fee, Fie, Fo, Fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman’
And what does that smell like?
It smells of Prehistoric Beaker Folk from Europe,
Of Celts and Romans and their Auxiliaries from Africa and Asia,
Of Picts, and Scots and Angles and Saxons
And Jutes and Vikings and Normans;
Of Flemish weavers
And Protestants fleeing the Counter-Reformation,
And Jews and Africans and Poles and Hungarians
And Germans and Travellers and Czechs and Italians
Ugandans and Irish and Indians
And Sri Lankans and Bangladeshis and Pakistanis
And West Indians and Cypriots and refugees from Chile
And all the others I have missed out because I am writing at speed
Before I miss the ‘bus’
The Omnibus – Latin Word, meaning ‘all’.

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St George 2021

Stuart Butler

Thursday, July 1st, 2021

Buy George, bye George, by George,
It’s my jubilee too this year,
Fifty years of hopes and fears,
And while you couldn’t call my life
A total exercise in active citizenship,
You couldn’t call it total subjection either, I suppose.
But it’s fifty years of being both English and British –
An infant school pupil proudly waving the Union flag,
Proudly marching on Commonwealth Day in 1956;
A small boy growing up with his parents’ memories,
Tall tell tales of true patriotism and killing,
Sitting on his dad’s knee after the pub,
Shooting Japs in the jungle,
Behind pre-fab enemy lines,
Watching “Dunkirk” at the Saturday morning flicks,
Making up the airfix kits
Of Hurricanes and Spitfires,
While the BBC showed yet another Union Jack
Sliding down the pole as yet another colony
Gained its freedom,
As yet another Gold Coast
Became yet another Ghana,
And your brand new stamp album became sad Imperial History.
But in Geography at Grammar School,
You still coloured in the pink bits,
And had debates about Africa,
And whether it was ready for independence,
As you saw the rise of Enoch Powell,
And the march of the London Dockers,
When you went off to University,
As your left wing politics, republicanism
And internationalism now divided you from your parents;
And the rise of the NF, the ANL and RAR
Also meant a similar alienation at the Silver Jubilee,
Whilst war over the Falklands and policy in Northern Ireland,
And the annexation of St. George and the Union Jack
By the racist right hooligans and xenophobes,
Also led to a similar feeling of alienation,
Even when seeing the red cross fly on the local church
On William Shakespeare’s birthday.
But like many of my generation and persuasion,
I have both a visceral and an intellectual patriotism,
A deep love of my country and the conclusion
That this is my England, my England too;
And so I will wear the red cross this year,
(I always wear a poppy)
And I will re-assert the traditions of which I am proud,
And re-emphasise the continuities that I carry,
The traditions of the free-born Englishman and woman,
Of Piers Plowman and Wat Tyler,
The Diggers and the Levellers,
The support groups for escaped slaves,
The opponents of slavery,
The United Englishmen and Irishmen,
The Chartists,
The opponents of Empire,
The Great War Poets,
The anti-fascist fighters in Spain,
The heroes, sung and unsung of World War Two,
The protectors of our environment and heritage,
The campaigners for a pluralist and diverse society,
The ones who are fighting exclusion,
The creators of a new rainbow new millennium Britain,
All those of us who embrace multiple identities,
British, English, European, African,
Caribbean and Asian global citizens –
We take back the Cross of Saint George,
And give it a new inclusive meaning,
For patriotism is no longer the last refuge of the scoundrel.

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It’s Coming Rome! ~ Day 17 Euro 2020 haiku

Crispin Thomas

Wednesday, June 30th, 2021

in the tightest clash

Kane and Sterling fire the dream

it’s coming Rome

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Warning : England Still Contain Hope

Crispin Thomas

Tuesday, June 29th, 2021

we sailed through qualifiers
like toy ducks in a bath
we felt our group looked doable
but dare not plot our path
with home advantage on our side
our opener looked tough
the dark horse of Croatia
but one goal was enough

Scotland fought as Scotland do
and proved our sternest test
we held our nerve and took the point
though we weren’t at our best
up next the Czechs would prove a threat
we fought with heart and soul
a battle won to put us top
again a single goal

and as we meet long-time foes
we ask is this our time?
there’ll never be a better chance
to put the past behind
a moment for returning fans
to roar on this young side
a chance to make the quarters
and restore dreams and pride

like sailors bound for stormy seas
to lands so far away
we journey on with something
and our belief this day
like tins they carried with them
like warnings you might see
of something hidden deep inside
like sap within a tree

a time to raise our voices
to be the extra man
for everybody out there
to summon all they can
to leave the Germans all at sea
and struggling hard to cope
and like a warning remind all..
we still contain hope

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Teenage Kicks

kevin halls

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2021

So England go on through
while playing not that well,
can they lift the trophy ?
only time will tell.
Yet with only two goals scored
but an impressive clean sheet,
they aren’t a fluent attacking side
yet becoming hard to beat.
But Southgate’s looking to the future
with youngsters full of tricks,
in Jude Bellingham and Bukayo Saka
it’s not old heads but teenage kicks.
Now for the knock out football
will the Three Lions go on the attack,
or remain defensively minded
be rigid and tight at the back ?
They’ll be playing again at Wembley
verses Germany, Hungary, Portugal, or France,
I’d fancy them against the Magyars
but the others could lead us a merry dance.
But football is a funny old game
anything can happen as we all know,
it’s like being a long suffering Coventry City fan
you learn to go with the flow.
So can England win the Euros
and leave us supporters on a high
or will it be here we go again
it’s been like watching Crispin’s paint dry !

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England & Croatia’s Day12 ~ Euro 2020 haiku

Crispin Thomas

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2021

threat’ning to ignite

England top with seven points

grind out a result

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Scotland hearts are crushed

Modric skill denies his age

for Crostia

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Source: http://footballpoets.org/news/poem-tags/england/page/5/