The pampered lords and ladies robed proclaimed from gilded halls on high That strangers should be welcomed in and treated as our hearth-bound tie; We set the board with honest fare and cleared the benches by the fire, Yet soon they sat as titled guests, demanding more with bold desire.

Upon two hills where banners flew and pastures met the sky, Two farmers ruled their separate lands, each proud, each justified. One called his flock “enlightened souls,” too wise for guard or chain, He freed the dogs, pulled down the posts, and loosed them to the plain. “No need for walls,” he cried aloud, “nor watchmen stern of face, For trust and kindness guard us best, let mercy take their place.” So wolves came down by silent moon, unseen from outer lands, And met no bark, nor gate, nor gun, just faith in foolish hands.

The alley stank of iron rain, of rot, and weary bone’s lament, The eyes that once had seen the sun now burned in dull torment. The paws were raw from glass and grit, the ribs like winter’s sticks, No mother’s milk, no kindly tongue, just hunger’s cruel tricks. Each sound became a lash of fear, each step a curse of pain, Each shadow whispered human shape, and then the hurt again. No moon gave comfort through the grime, no breeze gave clean reprieve, For trust once torn by hands of man is slow again to weave.

The clinker-built cutter lifts her pride where the steel-grey rollers run, White cloud is clewed to the spar’s tall reach in the eye of the fleeting sun; Her bowsprit gleams like a silver lance where the dolphin squadrons weave, And the spume is hurled in the level gusts the whitecaps rise to heave.

The light came in and stirred my dreams; I rose to greet the sun once more, Though joints protested every step, my tail still wagged along the floor. I did not bark nor whine nor stray, I only longed to do what's right, To reach the grass, to greet the breeze, to mark the morning, hold the light. But legs betrayed where heart was true, and so he came, my master's arm, The cradle strong, the whisper low, the breath of love, the breath of calm.

The sky unbuckled at the rim where thunder crowned the plain, And from the loam, the river rose with judgement in its reign. It leapt the banks where cotton fed, and swept the homesteads bare, And bore away the daughters’ song that once had lingered there. No cradle sways, no echo sings beneath the shattered tree, The river took the children’s song, and drowned what was to be.

I watched the fields where once we strode, now fallow, brown, and bare, The scents of grain and orchard lost to poisoned plastic air. The master's hand once tilled the soil, now clenched in silent dread, For those who rule behind the screen would see the garden dead. They speak of clouds and carbon lines while scratching at the root, And crush the farmer’s honest trade beneath a booted suit.

The watchmen’s post stands scorched and bare, the lamp untrimmed, the bell unswung, While lords in silken chamber chairs debate what makes a felon young. The thief walks out with law in hand, his sentence penned in victim’s ink, And shopmen hide their battered eyes for fear their fate's the same, they think.

One king once struck the Roman yoke, and made his stand by English shore, He cast the Pope’s bright chain aside, and crowned the Book his nation’s law. Yet now, beneath the vaulted Dome, where saints once knelt and kings were crowned, A softer treason stirs the air, where silence mocks the Gospel’s sound. For Westminster, with silvered tongue, now sells its soul by carbon scale, And breaks from Canterbury’s hand, to court a Dragon wrapped in veil.

I woke where warmth and sleep abide, where master’s young ones lie, Their fingers tugged my ear with love beneath the waking sky. She, soft of voice and full of smells, brought food and stroked my head, And master drew my Daycloak close, and out the pack then led. The garden laughed with light and scent, the gate swung wide and free, Oh joy! Oh world of hidden smells! Come dance and play with me!

They scorn the stock from whence they came, and curse the fields their grandsires trod, They fling the gates to lawless tides and call it virtue, not a fraud. They kiss the feet of foreign foes, but mock the hand that ploughed their land, And trade the crown for counterfeit, with coin and power in open hand.

When Nelson’s hand was ash and dust, his wake endured in steel and sail, And every mast from Plymouth sound to Sunda bore the lion’s tale. From Jutland’s roar to Falkland’s swell, Britannia watched with brow unbowed, Her pennants flared in foreign winds, her ensigns tore through hostile cloud. The sun would never set, they swore, on hulls that ruled from tide to tide, For law was laid on cannon decks where liberty and sea-power ride. Yet now the docks are rotted dreams, and rust weeps down the bo’sun's chain, The ghost of Drake still stalks the strait, but finds his ocean throne in vain.