In a few days’ time, we are moving house from West Oxfordshire to West Cambridgeshire, for a number of reasons that only just outweigh reasons to stay. We have loved living in Eynsham parish, meeting all the people we have come to know and appreciate, enjoying the countryside and wildlife.
I thought I would sign off with another poem, which was written back in 2019, because we knew then that we would probably have to move before too long. The first and last lines deliberately echo Edward Thomas’s famous short poem ‘Adlestrop’, written in 1915.
Nearly 50 years ago, I lived in Eynsham for a couple of years when I was studying English Literature, and played football for Eynsham Reserves, managed then by Bernard ‘Smudger’ Smith. In November 1975, we played Adlestrop away. The village did not have a ground of its own; so we played the match at nearby Oddington, whose pitch was itself on a pronounced slope. Having won the toss, the Adlestropians made full use of their local knowledge and played downhill. We were 5-0 down by half time. Although we drew the second half 1-1, the damage had long been done.
Anyway, here is the poem, recently re-titled ‘Nine Springs, Nine Summers’. I hope it adequately reflects the deep fondness I feel for Eynsham - and its people - and the enjoyment I have derived from writing these Notes from the North:
Yes, I remember 1 City Farm, the barn
where we stopped a few years almost like stewards
on a short-term contract. Although traffic could
intrude aurally, few people passed nearby
and skylarks were audible from the garden.
Listed stone barns - sheepfold and lambing pen, cow
shed, pigsty and hayloft - had roots in gently
sloping fields where farmers had farmed for decades
on variable soil sparingly so that
butterflies and moths exploded from grasses
and wildflowers in the oat field in summer,
and finches and yellowhammers burst in spring
from hedgerows like solar flares. Swallows nested
in ashwood rafters and our birdfeeders seemed
to feed all the small birds of West Oxfordshire.