I wrote this poem after talking with some friends about their own homeland of the Philippines. They always talk about ‘going back home’, and I suddenly thought that I wasn’t really sure I had any particular affinity towards England, and whether it even held any real identity and meaning for me. But as I began to write, I began to realise exactly why I love England, and exactly why it is my home.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I like England.
I like the constant rain.
Then the sun.
Then the rain again. The dark clouds that move across the sky and
break,
the lightning like the cracking of an egg.
The rain the yolk as it is poured
into the mixing bowl of houses, trees and brightly colored umbrella tops.
The roast dinners. The little country churches.
I like the red London buses that snake their way around the narrow streets,
stopping occasionally to pick up a panting passer by whose
trainers are hitting the ground with unbreakable speed.
I like the top hats and tradition.
The cockney ‘Gotcha’ and the cultured ‘More tea, vicar?’.
I like the little pubs that are hidden away in a midst of forestry,
their blinking fairy lights and smoking chimney a homing beacon for
anyone with a thirst for a pint of froth.
I like the Queen.
I’m not a royalist, but I like her.
I like her speech on Christmas Day as the family gather round the plasma screen to watch her coffered grey curls speak of peace, God
and the year behind us.
I like her Palace.
And her grandsons.
And I particularly like gingers.
I like Dickens, C.S.Lewis and Midsummer Murders.
Spike Milligan, Tommy Cooper and Norman Wisdom were my nursing milk.
British comedy brought me up and left me the way I am today.
That would probably explain a few things.
The Goon Show was always playing on my tape machine
and T-Rex was the first CD I slotted into my portable CD player,
pushing the headphones into my 8 year old ears and pretending not to sing along to ‘Get it on’.
I like the Beatles.
I wish I did live in a Yellow Submarine,
but I guess I’m going to just have to
Let It Be.
Jane Austen taught me about true love and my ideal man.
I’m still waiting...
Stiff collars cover beads of sweat and rustling skirts hide
trembling knees as palms touch to dance to the quartet of strings.
Each note.
Each glance.
Each touch
another movement towards a shared passion.
But for now, Elizabeth Bennet loathes Mr Darcy.
And we wouldn’t have it any other way.
I like England.
and its constant
rain.
