Christmas by Sir John Betjeman

The bells of waiting Advent ring,
The Tortoise stove is lit again
And lamp-oil light across the night
Has caught the streaks of winter rain
In many a stained-glass window sheen
From Crimson Lake to Hookers Green.

The holly in the windy hedge
And round the Manor House the yew
Will soon be stripped to deck the ledge,
The altar, font and arch and pew,
So that the villagers can say
'The church looks nice' on Christmas Day.

Provincial Public Houses blaze,
Corporation tramcars clang,
On lighted tenements I gaze,
Where paper decorations hang,
And bunting in the red Town Hall
Says 'Merry Christmas to you all'.

And London shops on Christmas Eve
Are strung with silver bells and flowers
As hurrying clerks the City leave
To pigeon-haunted classic towers,
And marbled clouds go scudding by
The many-steepled London sky.

And girls in slacks remember Dad,
And oafish louts remember Mum,
And sleepless children's hearts are glad.
And Christmas-morning bells say 'Come!'
Even to shining ones who dwell
Safe in the Dorchester Hotel.

And is it true,
This most tremendous tale of all,
Seen in a stained-glass window's hue,
A Baby in an ox's stall?
The Maker of the stars and sea
Become a Child on earth for me?

And is it true? For if it is,
No loving fingers tying strings
Around those tissued fripperies,
The sweet and silly Christmas things,
Bath salts and inexpensive scent
And hideous tie so kindly meant,

No love that in a family dwells,
No carolling in frosty air,
Nor all the steeple-shaking bells
Can with this single Truth compare -
That God was man in Palestine
And lives today in Bread and Wine.

Agricultural Caress by Sir John Betjeman

 

Keep me from Thelma's sister Pearl!

She puts my senses in a whirl,

Weakens my knees and keeps me waiting

Until my heart stops palpitating.

The debs may turn disdainful backs

On Pearl's uncouth mechanic slacks,

And outraged see the fire that lies

And smoulders in her long-lashed eyes.

Have they such weather-freckled features,

The smooth sophisticated creatures?

Ah, not to them such limbs belong,

Such animal movements sure and strong,

Such arms to take a man and press

In agricultural caress

His head to hers, and hold him there

Deep buried in her chestnut hair.

God shrive me from this morning lust

For supple farm girls if you must,

Send the cold daughter of an earl -- 

But spare me Thelma's sister Pearl! 

Two Poems by Sir John Bentjeman

Slough

Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough
It isn't fit for humans now,
There isn't grass to graze a cow
        Swarm over, Death! 

Come, bombs, and blow to smithereens

Those air-conditioned, bright canteens,

Tinned fruit, tinned meat, tinned milk, tinned beans

        Tinned minds, tinned breath.

Mess up the mess they call a town--

A house for ninety-seven down

And once a week a half-a-crown

        For twenty years,

And get that man with double chin

Who'll always cheat and always win,

Who washes his repulsive skin

        In women's tears,

And smash his desk of polished oak

And smash his hands so used to stroke

And stop his boring dirty joke

        And make him yell.

But spare the bald young clerks who add

The profits of the stinking cad;

It's not their fault that they are mad,

        They've tasted Hell.

It's not their fault they do not know

The birdsong from the radio,

It's not their fault they often go

        To Maidenhead

And talk of sports and makes of cars

In various bogus Tudor bars

And daren't look up and see the stars

        But belch instead.

In labour-saving homes, with care

Their wives frizz out peroxide hair

And dry it in synthetic air

        And paint their nails.

Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough

To get it ready for the plough.

The cabbages are coming now;

        The earth exhales.

The Heart of Thomas Hardy

The heart of Thomas Hardy flew out of Stinsford Church

A little thumping fig, it rocketed over the elm trees,

Lighter than air it flew straight to where its Creator

Waited in golden nimbus, just as in eighteen sixty,

Hardman and son of Brum had depicted Him in the chancel,

Slowly out of the grass, slitting the mounds in the centre

Riving apart the rocks, rose the new covered corpses

Tess and Jude and His Worship, various unmarried mothers,

Woodmen, cutters of turf, adulterers, church restorers,

Turning aside the stones thump on the upturned churchyard.

Soaring over the elm trees slower than Thomas Hardy,

Weighted down with a Conscience, now for the first time fleshly

Taking form as a growth hung from the feet like a sponge-bag.

There, in the heart of the nimbus, slowly revolved the corpses

Radiating around the twittering heart of Hardy,

Slowly started to turn in the light of their own Creator

Died away in the night as frost will blacken a dahlia.