Mercer Simpson
Speculative Building in Edwardian Salisbury
Long military rows of brick-red villas
which could be
the scarlet-coated infantry
of the Boer War
housed artisans, uneasily prosperous
in prim Edwardian times
aspiring to the lower-middle-class
so kept a housemaid on a pittance:
No hawkers, circulars,
and also on front door, Tradesmen no admittance.
Each home identical
in blood-red brick, with matching tiles,
for marching up the hill in terraces.
They climb their street, Majuba Road,
in short, slow steps, all out of breath
for endless, undeserving miles
like the perspiring baker on his rounds,
the red-faced Mr Bunn who sells his loaves
at the back door, and enters in
for kitchen slap-and-tickle with the maid.
Each one wears a lace cap
of white-fretted weather-boarding
whose eyebrow-eaves arch so demurely
above an innocent gable.
A bun in the oven for everyone!
The girls will blush at his familiarity:
O Mr Bunn you are a one!
His face is flushed brick-dust
as is his hand-cart, pushing up the hill,
grunting and squeaking axle-turns
of bright red wheels.
Here all await the coming of their Revolution
down in the uncomfortably privileged South.
which could be
the scarlet-coated infantry
of the Boer War
housed artisans, uneasily prosperous
in prim Edwardian times
aspiring to the lower-middle-class
so kept a housemaid on a pittance:
No hawkers, circulars,
and also on front door, Tradesmen no admittance.
Each home identical
in blood-red brick, with matching tiles,
for marching up the hill in terraces.
They climb their street, Majuba Road,
in short, slow steps, all out of breath
for endless, undeserving miles
like the perspiring baker on his rounds,
the red-faced Mr Bunn who sells his loaves
at the back door, and enters in
for kitchen slap-and-tickle with the maid.
Each one wears a lace cap
of white-fretted weather-boarding
whose eyebrow-eaves arch so demurely
above an innocent gable.
A bun in the oven for everyone!
The girls will blush at his familiarity:
O Mr Bunn you are a one!
His face is flushed brick-dust
as is his hand-cart, pushing up the hill,
grunting and squeaking axle-turns
of bright red wheels.
Here all await the coming of their Revolution
down in the uncomfortably privileged South.
Page(s) 39
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