Stopham House Lodge

The lodge at Stopham House
has seen some better days
sadly now in ruins
its plight is its malaise
It's walls are brittle, crumbling
Trees sprout out from the roof
and yet with pride of ages
it retains an aire aloof
With 'cock-a-hoop' to passing time
almost as if to say
'I'm still tall and standing here'
It's not yet had its day

©Jemverse

Photo – Jempics

(revisiting) The Shilling

9 of 10 in the ‘Places & Pleasing’ series

I remember when I was a lad
how much a shilling gave
were I to spend it, even though
I was encouraged then to save

And so it was in West George Street
in Glasgow, Sunday night
The Shilling Brewing Co I found
built on an old bank site

And though it cost a little more
the beer there that I had
gave memory of the pleasure felt
with a shilling as a lad

©Jemverse

The Shilling Brewing Co was founded in Glasgow in 2016 and occupies the premises of a former Royal Bank of Scotland site. The old bank vault doors remain in the basement when the ladies and gents toilets are now.

A shilling was a unit of English currency before decimalisation in 1968. It was worth 12 old pennies or around 5 pence in today’s money. Back in the day you could get a lot with a shilling; but nowadays you can get virtually nothing with a 5 pence piece!

Photo – Jempics

‘The Shilling‘ was first posted to Jemverse in May 2017

(revisiting) Whitley Bay

8 of 10 in the ‘Places & Pleasing’ series

St Mary’s lighthouse on the coast
here at Whitley Bay
On a coastal island
at the tail end of a day

With rain flecks in the evening breeze
we crossed at ebbing tide
Careful not to slip and fall
though the slipway was quite wide

And from the island summit
‘Neath the white walls of the tower
we looked out to the northern sea
and its majestic power

This really is lovely place
in North East England fair
So we stayed a little while
and just revelled being there

©Jemverse

[St Mary’s island is a small sandstone promontory in Whitley Bay, Tyne & Wear and the siting for St Mary’s Lighthouse, built in 1898. The island’s connected to mainland at low tide by a rocky causeway for around 16 hours each day]

Photo – Jempics

‘Whitley Bay‘ was first posted to Jemverse in March 2017

(revisiting) History lost to time

7 of 10 in the ‘Places & Pleasing’ series

Walked down the mile of Bute Street
to the pier head in the bay
Trod where the Glamorganshire canal
supplied the port back in the day

The canal bed now though long since gone
Coal dust replaced with grime
Its waterbed now carries cars
its history lost to time

Once it was said that you could cross
the bay across the boats
So many were there in the port
the age-old saying gloats

Now though the waters of the bay
devoid of shipping lie
The coal mines of the valleys quiet
no longer export ply

Yet in a new millennium
in twenty-seventeen
Regeneration gives the port
the best life it has seen

©Jemverse

[Cardiff’s Bute Street now links Cardiff Bay with the City Centre. However, prior to 1830 it was part of the old Glamorganshire canal which originally ran alongside the River Taff from Merthyr Tydfil to the sea at Cardiff Bay. The final section of the canal was closed in 1951. Today – just the old Customs House (listed but currently derelict) remains at the top of Bute Street to remember the history that’s now lost to time].

Photo – Jempics

‘History lost to time‘ was first posted to Jemverse in March 2017

(revisiting) Temple Cross Round

6 of 10 in the ‘Places & Pleasing’ series

In the Bristol blitz bombing
of the second world war
The Temple Cross roof was
brought to the floor
Yet when the rubble was cleared
though it’s fate was then sealed
some circular Templar
foundations revealed

What was then a square ruin
had once been quite round
A fact only discovered
when razed to the ground
And now preserved for all time
lest history we shun
Two ruined churches
stand together as one

©Jemverse

The Temple church (aka Holy Cross and Temple Cross) ruins stand in the Temple Meads area of Bristol in the UK. Bombed during the Bristol blitz in WWII, it was only when the detritus from the ruined roof and floor was cleared after the war that the foundations of an earlier entirely circular Templar church were revealed. The Templar building, now marked by a ring of shale inside the nave of the present ruin, dates from 1100. The ‘modern’ parish of Holy Cross was built over it between 1300 and 1450.

['Temple Cross Round' was first posted to Jemverse in January 2016]

(revisiting) Whiling away

3 of 10 in the ‘Places & Pleasing’ series

Took a trip to Mordue’s
North Shields in Tyne and Wear
Rather rude I thought to not
So I bought an Amber beer

Caught a Metro down in Jarrow
But I’ll not be walking down
Three hundred miles, tad far for me
To get to London town

Sat a while at Central Station
Had a coffee, wrote again
Whiled away an hour or so
Whilst waiting for my train

©Jemverse

In October 1936, with the Shipbuilding industry in severe decline,  207 workers marched from Jarrow to Westminster in London, a distance of over 300 miles, to lobby Parliament against unemployment. It became known as “The Jarrow Crusade”

Photo – ‘Spirit of Jarrow’ by Graham Ibbeson – Viking Centre, Jarrow, Tyne & Wear

[“Whiling away” was first posted to Jemverse in January 2015]

(revisiting) Olde Trip

2 of 10 in the ‘Places & Pleasing’ series

At Ye Olde trip to Jerusalem
A pint of Olde Trip in the rain
A welcome respite from the work I have done
Refreshment for me and my brain
The oldest inn in the country it’s said
Nottingham fort on the hill
The warmth of the sun again breaking through
Though the grey clouds above threaten still

©Jemverse

[Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem is a grade II listed pub in Nottingham established as an Inn in 1189. It is built into the base of the rock on which Nottingham Castle stands].

Photo – Jempics

[“Olde Trip” was first posted to Jemverse in August 2014]

(revisiting) Castle Acre

1 of 10 in the ‘Places & Pleasing’ series

In the valley shadow cast
By the Castle Acre walls
Castle Acre Priory rests
Its ruins proud and tall
And where once Clunaic monks trod
Its cool aisles in silent prayer
Tourists wander slowly
While sheep graze safely there.

©Jemverse

[‘Castle Acre’ in Norfolk is the largest and best preserved Monastic site in England dating back to 1090. Home of the first Clunaic order of monks, established by William de Warrenne and dissolved by King Henry VIII]

Photo – Jempics

“Castle Acre” was first posted to Jemverse in July 2014

St Lawrence’s Lament

Deconsecrated hallowed walls to commercial gain
Shamefaced the stone walls weep
The ageing tower crenels kiss the sky
and now glazed windows
arch to residential pews

Adjacent still, forlorn the church school doors
etched into stone now hide
the jubilant voice of eager learning
faded into silent time
closed to commercial mind

Yet still an echo calls from  passing years
religion's words still cry
to this edifice, a monument to former days
saved from demolishment
from those now re-interred

©Jemverse

Photo – Jempics

[St Lawrence’s church was built in the 15th century with 18th and 19th century additions. It was deconsecrated in the early 1960s and had become derelict until 2021 when it became part of the Ballymore led Brentford re-development project. As a part of the re-development, 850 bodies including the Commonwealth graves of two First World War heroes, victims of the 1642 civil war Battle of Brentford and builders of the Grand Union Canal in the 19th century were exhumed and re-interred in a Woking cemetery. The ex-church building has now been remodelled to provide luxury housing].

Brentford Ait fading

There's an abandoned tug listing to port
moored up near Brentford Ait
it's been quite a while since anyone cared
so it's in quite a terrible state

There's a wolf on the bow so there was some intent
at a time for it boldly to go
perhaps plying for trade on Old Father Thames
on the water to go with the flow

But those days are gone long time now I fear
and the listing says more than words can
that this once proud lady now slips away
from the time she proudly began

©Jemverse

Photo – Jempics

Brentford Ait is a four and half acre uninhabited island on the river Thames.