Counter-Heritage

  It felt like textbook psychogeography: Walking in a straight line along the old North Wilts Canal, In a ‘playful wandering exploration’, Reimagining the railway works and the seemingly endless sidings, Remembering where I used to train-spot and play football, Long before the advent of these seemingly endless roads.   We walked past the Victorian railway railings And the high red brick walls, With their seemingly endless graffiti, Despite the signs threatening hefty fines, Past an old railway iron gate with ornate columns, The double-lock once important for railway security, But the gates now lie open on a road to nowhere.   But the carefully wrought railings were a delight With a high-tide of creamy may blossom, With an occasional disconcerting cluster Of last autumn’s red berry mist of fruitfulness, To remind us of William Faulkner’s dictum: ‘The past is never dead. It’s not even past.’ But is that so?   The Oasis lies in classic edgelands terrain: A brownfield scrubland of ‘guerrilla ecology’, The Oasis itself, erupting from the landscape Like some gaunt symbol of lost modernity. I took a photo and sent it to my children: “Omg! I loved the Oasis! I remember thinking the shower and wave machines were the most exciting things ever. I remember your shorts, dad, over-inflating and us getting stuck on the tubes.” “Those days out on the train in the summer holidays to the Oasis are such treasured memories. A real special treat.” I read their messages and stared at the dome, Standing in what felt like a dystopian movie-set, So hard to imagine now that...