Across the Kingdom
The weather arrives in the post from Europe
By pack-horse from the Near East
Camel from a variety of deserts
And on WeChat from the Orient
Nothing seems to be coming from the rest of Africa
Or from any of the Americas
(We might need to check the why of that)
Or did we miss a phone call?
Probably some places in the Southern Hemisphere
Or on the other side of the world
Are too far away to send us weather
I don’t know and I don’t really care
So I’m just leaving those lines as they are
It was just an idea almost certainly not worth
Pursuing any further than line 8 or 9
And probably not even that far
So anyway the curtain is going up on Autumn now
Which is why weather came up as a topic today
We think of people donning capes and sou’westers
The anorak from the Inuit annoraaq
Imagine a wet and windy English evening
Ernie the Engineer is in the railway yards
In the sidings the trains have done their work for the day
Remember the Golden Age of Steam
There is no steam now only the heavy modern air
And dreaming of escape we have fallen in love
With the Gulf Stream although
We don’t really understand exactly what it is
It is not unusual to become over-excited
As the mind wanders as minds do
And it becomes necessary to call in at a chemist
To purchase a cooling draught
And then go look for someone to help organize
Our thoughts our ideas our life
Martin Stannard