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Poetry Library Southbank Centre - The Poetry Library housing the Arts Council Collection at Southbank Centre

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Ian Pople

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Top Street

to Karen Maitland and Diana Syder

Where mules pull cold and men over broken moor
by furze and briar to close stone walls, tucked
bundles of sheep run to either side and weather

is place. Cloud in the night. Cloud seeping
to the stream edge where sheep stumble and hills,
etched with trees, mark a world's boundary.

Cobble tracks run by cottages and straining loads
pass splitting lintels and plank nailed shutters.
The houses crowd to brick, stone, track

and each other, and tight windows give out
light and shape but never edge. Small feet
seem to ghost from doorways, the children's eyes

stare and small mouths frame voices barely tamed
in schools where teachers come as refugees
from the town. You bend under lintels to straw

and litter; animals and children are much the same -
white smudges in reed smoke or a shuffling warmth
just beyond reach. Fire is feared, that spreads

beyond the spit to catch greasy fur and scream
both beast and child into the night where darkness
falls among leather pails and wind driven voices.

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