By Roslyn Renwick
These are our streets,
of our ancient well loved feisty town
which we weave our lives around,
built from the hopes and dreams of all of us,
and all those who fought for its survival, down the centuries before.
Hardy fisher folk began it all
on enduring foundations of harvests from the deep,
building their berths in the shelter of our river’s inlets, and temporary shielings,
which gave our town a name that’s lasted centuries,
that nurtured its docks, mines, boatyards and engineering works.
Now, along with fishing, its building societies and banks still stand guard
over our everyday aspirations of roots and home.
And the everyday pilgrimage for groceries and household supplies,
the remedies for sore hips and knees and aches and pains,
a treat of pasties or sticky buns or cream cakes for tea for the bairns,
are the tiny bricks these streets are made of.
It’s where we go for the blow dry weekend hairdo,
or bait for a bit of fishing off the quay.
It’s the vistas we stroll along on Sunday afternoons to view
and photograph and paint
the songs we play and sing in its halls and pubs and clubs.
These streets
are not just a few historical fading images in some dusty book,
given a reluctant hasty look,
before being “regenerated,” “improved,” or even “condemned,” by developers
and planners with unreal coffee table photos,
and brittle, bottom-line smiles.
No. They’re our streets, we lived them.
We are the ones to say how they’re woven through our lives,
in this, our well-loved feisty town.
