Rodborough Fields and John Clare Day, July 13th

Living in Stroud, with common land all around

The hilltops above Stroud’s Five Valleys,

And living in a county with Royalty’s

Seal of approval, chocolate box second homes,

And reverence for quilt-work field hedgerows,

It’s easy to forget the novelty

Of this seeming, traditional landscape;

It’s not always easy to re-question

The picturesque ecology of a hedge,

To reframe the cultural meanings of ‘Olde Englande’,

And rant instead about enclosure’s wrongs,

The loss of freedom, and liberty to roam,

The criminalisation of wandering;

John Clare helps us feel this transgression,

He gives voice to the ‘village Hampdens’ –

Anonymous toilers in field and home –

He rescues them from the witheringly

‘Enormous condescension of posterity’:

‘There once were lanes that every valley wound –

Inclosure came, and every path was stopt;

Each tyrant fixed his sign where paths were found,

To hint a trespass now who cross’d the ground;

Justice is made to speak as they command;

The high road now must be each stinted bound;

Inclosure, thou’rt a curse upon the land…’