New Library at Pontefract

(on seeing a film featuring John Betjeman)

Long, long ago, when I was twelve,

John Betjeman was here

to make romance for Pontefract,

to make it very clear

that this was not some ‘northern town’

of legend, cold and drear,

but hill-top place, Italianate -

the self-same atmosphere

that brought the olive growers in

to mark...

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