There are contrasts in this collection as the pastoral shifts slowly into blight. Two poems that could be seen as examples of ‘before and after’, illustrate this. An earlier poem ‘On Cabbage Hill’ is subtitled ‘Watching Deer’. Primroses, kingfishers and ‘rippled ripening corn’ share the scene as the observer is attentive to deer ‘inching through the wheat.’ The last poem in the collection is called ‘On Cabbage Hill Again’ and there are no more ‘secret deer’ but instead a landscape of ‘scaffold poles’, ‘tarmac paths’ and ‘estate houses in neat rows’. ‘This is now,’ says the narrator.
Introductory notes explain that Warfield was originally a Saxon settlement, rural in character for centuries until, in the twentieth century it became subject to overspill from nearby Bracknell. Constant threats from developers and planners have led to ongoing opposition from those who regret changes in the name of progress at the expense of flora and fauna. ‘There is still much to be found that is wonderful and inspiring (in Warfield)’ writes Patrick Osada, ‘yet sadly major changes to the environment and, consequently, to our wildlife becomes more pronounced as the house building extends.’
Transformation feels too exalted a word to use for the alterations in atmosphere and appearance from rural to suburban, but changes are still happening and transformation, in spite of some attempts at re-wilding, is almost total. Poems mark the process. ‘Frost Epiphany’ offers a fine example of the pastoral mood. Lyrical and spiritual in tone ‘Everything just gleams:/the pastures glittering, /each twig and grass blade/frosted – so complete.’ This is a scene where ‘a robin stopped to sing for me/and all the robin world.’ (‘January Sunday’). As winter turns to Spring the landscape is rich in ‘daffodil with bluebell/sallow, hazel, primrose, cowslip/anemone and celandine.’(‘Unseasonal’).
Place names, and their loss of meaning, are important in The Warfield Poems, recalling history, nature and folklore: Quelm Lane, Lark’s Hill, Hazlewood, Battle Bridge, the pub ‘The Yellow Rose’. At Owlswood Park the narrator comes across a notice shouting ‘CONSTRUCTION SITE, KEEP OUT.’ Here, in this ‘world of brick all birds have flown’ and, in time, ‘the new estate will be unveiled/with streets named after heritage we share-/ but not one creature, tree or plant remains/to prove this place was once more than their names.’
The disappearance of local wildlife in Warfield is slow but insistent. In ‘Swallows’ the narrator records how ‘this year’ he hasn’t seen any of the birds:
From the rise above the house, I look across these empty skies;
swallows’ demise match changes to this place –
horses, meadows, paddocks now are gone
like acres of crops, hedgerows lost … farmland to developers.
So, with our changing rural scene, swallows visits ceased.
A poem I find particularly interesting in ‘The Warfield Poems’ is the anti-pastoral theme of ‘Not an Ode to Autumn’ – a response to John Keats’ Ode. Here the wind is cold, there are only crab apples on the trees and ‘late Autumn mists’ hide ‘all vestige of sun, moon and tide’. In the air is ‘a chill of death.’
More signs erected by developers illustrate a dilemma not only confined to Warfield. Building Communities for Everyone neglects to say ‘But not for hawthorn, fox, orchid or deer –/those residents have gone, their fields stripped bare.’ (‘Sunflower’). A Government Consultation paper has an idyllic tone with its Planning for the right homes in the right places but the result is also a ‘Countryside no more, landscape changed for ever …’ (‘The New Estate’).
Development versus destruction, growth as opposed to loss … poems in this collection combine in a tone of regret. ‘The Warfield Poems’ become an elegy.
Mandy Pannett 28th August 2024
