Does anyone know why 17 Borrowdale Road is missing?

Every day I walk past the empty space

and wonder why it’s not there.

 

No. 13 is missing as well but I suppose that’s just unlucky.

 

My husband was born in no. 48 in 1944.

He says there never was a house there;

the plot of land was used as an allotment,

probably to aid the war effort.

 

I lived at 36 Norrington Road. Does anyone remember me?

 

I remember a chap once told me

before the estate was built

a property was there and underneath  

there’s a tunnel that goes to Frankley. 

 

My Mom moved into Borrowdale Road in 1931, no.125.

She remembers an allotment and a power station. 

 

I think the tunnel started at Quinney’s Farm

and went to St Leonard’s Church.

It were used by the monks

to store all their worldly possessions.

 

I’ve heard about that tunnel, it goes back to Cromwell’s days.

When they burnt down the house next door to the church

they hid the treasure down the tunnel.

I live next door to where your mom lived.

 

I lived at 36 Norrington Road. Does anyone remember me? 

 

Yes, Cromwell had a lot of connections to the tunnel.

The bridle path is still in place from farm to church.

Severn Trent own it all now.

 

My friend lived at 122. We spent many hours over the fields.

 

About 5 years ago a well-dressed lady

knocked at  my front door.

She explained that she’d spent

her childhood in Borrowdale Road.

She asked to enter my garden

and there she started crying.

She looked around for a big oak tree,

but it was next door and they were out.

 

I lived at 36 Norrington Road. Does anyone remember me? 

 

The tunnel was built in Elizabethan times.

 

I lived in Norrington Road.

Those houses missing in Borrowdale 

line up exactly with one missing in Fitzroy Road

and another in Masonleys Road. 

You’ll find that the water from Elan Valley

is sent in big pipes underground to Birmingham.

That’s why it can’t be built on.

 

So why do they miss the numbers out?   

 

What do you think of the estate these days?  

 

I lived at 36 Norrington Road. Does anyone remember me?

 

It’s alright apart from the dog shit.

 

There isn’t a 36 Norrington Road.